


Blondie Loves Broody:  A Fenders RP Fic

by BlondieLovesBroody (so_dunwall)



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age II
Genre: Angst, Domestic Fluff, Fenders, Fluff and Smut, M/M, Shameless Smut
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-06
Updated: 2019-02-12
Packaged: 2019-09-13 04:15:35
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 66
Words: 255,160
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16885452
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/so_dunwall/pseuds/BlondieLovesBroody
Summary: A long-running Fenders roleplay.  Anders and Fenris wrestle with their own and one another's burdens.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is a long-running RP that started in 2011, when Inquisition was but a twinkle in Bioware's eye. Blame canon discrepancies on that.
> 
> Moving this over from Tumblr to escape the Blight.

It’s around midday when Aveline barges in on the clinic, well before any gang violence emergencies come rolling in as they often start to in the evenings. Anyone standing around is quick to slink backwards in the face of a guard in full armor, and they clear a path as she drags in Fenris’ body with his arm slung around her shoulders. His clothes do a good job of hiding it, but judging from the amount of blood coating one side and down his leg, it’s bad. Not that this wasn’t obvious from Aveline’s look of concern. “Anders!”

Anders grits his teeth and sets down the mortar and pestle. “Aneeri will take care of you,” he says quickly to the mother of the child seated on the table. An elven girl steps closer, taking over the business of grinding an herbal cure for the child’s labored breathing. Anders, meanwhile, hurries over to whichever vacant examination table Aveline’s found convenient, his face tightening with annoyance when he sees just who the Guard Captain has dragged in. Today, he thinks to himself, is going to suck. “I hope you’re sticking around to hold him down, because that’s about the only way I see him letting me cast anything within a yard of him,” he says to Aveline.

“He can try but I don’t think you’ll have a problem.” For a split second there’s a smirk on her face at the image of Fenris trying to drag himself away much less fight off any healing attempts, but as she carefully lowers the elf to the table the movement makes him gasp all too sharply and the ensuing shallow breaths bring her back to focus. "Apparently slavers carry spears these days, and one got lucky.“  
Fenris manages to get his shock under control enough to glance up, and finally notice where he is. "Of all places..”  
“If you want someone to reach inside you to sew you up, you’re welcome to it.”

“Yes, ‘of all places’. I do happen to be a Heeeeeal- ler.” Anders says it loudly, clearly, slowly. To reinforce his point, his hands hover over Fenris’s wounded side, a green haze of magic emanating from them as he gets a feel for the depth and severity of the wound. "And if you didn’t want to be here, maybe you should stop giving people so many good reasons to stab you.“

Fenris grabs Anders’ wrist instinctively, but like Aveline guessed he doesn’t have enough strength at this point to fight beyond that. Well, that and a grumble. "A mage that wants me to give in to slavers, why am I not surprised.” He makes a vague starting attempt to sit up, but Aveline’s simple hand on his shoulder puts an end to that. “Stay put.” She looks up to the mage, not really wanting to interrupt but sure to get a better idea of the situation from someone who’s not suffering quite so much blood loss. “How is he?”

“Actually? I want you to take a long walk off a short pier, and that’s got little to do with me being a mage,” Anders says sharply. To Aveline, he moderates his tone: "The blade missed his vitals, so he’s not septic. He’s lost a lot of blood. Even after I close the wound he’ll need to rest and eat to regain his strength.“ Anders’ brow furrows as he sets to knitting torn flesh. The touch of his magic isn’t harsh, but warm, soothing. He picks Fenris’s torn clothes away from the wound so he can see it, but takes a fair amount of care not to touch Fenris’s skin, either out of respect or plain distaste.

"With my luck you’ll miss something to help me with that.”  
Aveline ignores Fenris’ reply and just nods, very slowly lifting her hand away from his shoulder as if she expects him to try jumping up at any moment. By some miracle he doesn’t try, but it’s probably also by some miracle that he hasn’t passed out yet. “Do you think you can manage him from here? He’s a handful but I left my men to clean up the other end of this mess.”

“Oh, no. I think I’d rather force you to admit mages are actually -good- for something.” Anders doesn’t raise his head when Aveline speaks, needing to keep his focus on the injury he’s mending. "I can only do my best. I have people who can help if I really need any… but thank you, Aveline. Go take care of what you need to, and tell Hawke not to worry.“ Under Anders’ hands, the wound mends bit by bit, the edges closing together, muscle knitting, and then finally skin, melding smoothly. There’s a dark bruise still present, and a fair amount of tenderness and pain, as Anders works to knit together the smaller broken blood vessels.

Aveline gives a curt nod as she turns to go. If nothing else that gaping hole looks a lot better than it did when she arrived. "I’ll be sure to get a bottle of something strong from Varric later, I have a feeling you’ll need it.”

Fenris barely manages to wait for her to leave before he tries to move again, carefully working to prop himself up enough to see with his free arm that isn’t busy lightly digging against the mage’s wrist in case he tries anything funny. “You’re not quite as fast as they were in Tevinter.” It’s a bit of a lie, they didn’t care as much about details there either when it came to him.

“Maybe I care more about doing it right,” Anders counters, more or less as Fenris could have predicted. As for Aveline’s offer of a strong drink later, it actually lifts some of the stormclouds from his expression. It’s nice to have friends. At the pinch of Fenris’s clawed gauntlet, Anders heaves a sigh and stops trying to pick at Fenris’s torn clothes. "Alright. Since you’re conscious, could you pull your clothing away from the injury? I want to get a good look and see how far the bruising spreads, so I can make sure you’re not left with any weak points in the abdominal wall. If you think this is annoying, try coming back in a week with a hernia.“

Fenris levels a sharp glare on Anders more suited to if he was being asked to go kick a bear trap instead of just pulling his clothes aside. After a couple tense seconds his claws very reluctantly pry themselves from Anders’ hand, and his stomach painfully tightens in distrust. In the end it was probably a good thing the elf is awake though, as even just exposing that area of skin ends up being a bit of an ordeal involving loosening his belt and chest plate before he can start to unbutton the shirt. For not looking like he wears overmuch he’s gone to some lengths to keep his skin covered.

Anders, for his part, doesn’t try anything funny. He’s focused on healing, and Fenris’s exposed skin doesn’t garner so much as a casual ogling. He keeps his hands above the skin, not touching, and the bruises shrink and fade, until finally, the lyrium glow subsides and Anders exhales, sitting down heavily on a nearby stool. "Alright, it’s done. And if you could actually heed what I said about resting and eating, I’m sure Hawke would be ever so pleased. There will still be some tenderness, but one night of rest and it should subside. Good as new.”

As soon as Anders backs away Fenris very visibly relaxes again with everything but an actual sigh of relief. But once the mage isn’t distracting him anymore and he starts setting his clothes back into place, he pauses at where the wound used to be. “That’s all?”

“That’s all. You might want to see about getting cleaned up before you hit the streets, unless you want the Coterie to mistake you for easy pickings.” Anders rubs his head. "And while I’m as eager as you are for you to be on your way, you should take your time and get some porridge from the pot. You’re white as a sheet… kind of a dirty sheet, but still.“

"As long as I’m not as pale as you are mage, I’ve had worse.” Apparently worse with shoddy healing work, judging from his previous comments. But that’s also a silent blessing, as he doesn’t look to be making any sudden moves to blow off Anders and leave beyond pushing himself upright and casting a glance towards the blood he’s left on the table… which eventually leads to his clothes. At least they’re dark. “You think they’ll notice any difference?” Looks about like any other tuesday with Hawke, just that this time the blood is his.

“In your case, maybe not.” Anders rises to his feet again, still a bit weary, and casts about for a rag and bucket. He looks around the clinic, making sure that everything’s still in order. So far, nothing that his volunteers can’t tend to. One of them is already sweeping the dirt floor, covering over the trail of blood from the door. "Wait here a moment,“ Anders says, stalking off across the clinic without waiting for any acknowledgement from Fenris. When he returns, he has a cloth and washbasin in one arm, and a tankard of fresh milk in the other, with clots of cream floating in it. He sets the basin down beside Fenris, and offers him the milk. "More if you want it. I’ll get you something to eat.”

Wait, as if Fenris had any mind to really get up. All that blood he left on the way here, he doesn’t trust himself to remain steady if he tried without doing exactly what Anders suggested, not that he’d mention it. So instead he watches the volunteers mill about, with an edge of his consciousness keeping tabs on Anders.  
When the mage returns he blinks down at the milk, taking it a bit blankly. He can’t remember the last time he had anything to drink other than water or alcohol. “Are you always this eager?”

“Eager for… what exactly? What are you thinking I’m eager for?” Anders narrows his eyes, shrugging as he turns his back. He’s gone again for a moment or two, and then back with a bowl of porridge, a slice of cold ham, and chunk of crusty bread. "This is my job,“ Anders says, continuing without being prompted. "Even if nobody charges me with it but me. And ‘anything worth doing is worth doing well,’ or so it’s said.”

He just rolls his eyes and takes the moment to wash some of the blood off, mostly from his skin and the metal on his clothes. For all the jokes there’s probably more dried bloodstains on these clothes than anyone could count, if only they could see them without close inspection. When he finishes what he can and looks up to the mage’s return, he gestures towards the food. "This is exactly what I meant. It’s a wonder you haven’t worked yourself to death yet…“ Not that Fenris is refusing the meal, and manages to eat gracefully despite looking like he just escaped death. ”…or is that what the demon is for?“

Anders gives Fenris another narrow-eyed look. "Oh please. You’re going to go there? Really? You’re going to accuse me of exploiting poor defenseless demons to help sick, injured refugees?” Anders doesn’t bother to refute that, under the assumption that it hardly needs it. "Speaking of working myself to death, I have other people to help. Just make an anti-mage slur if you need anything.“

Fenris waves Anders away like some pesky bug. At this point he’s too exhausted to even make witty attacks. And distracted by food for that matter, even if he’s not exactly hungry after his insides met a new metal friend. "Why bother with slurs, when I could just call you what you really are.”

Anders takes the bait, glaring sharply over his shoulder. Then he turns. "You mean, 'The man who just saved your ungrateful life’? Why thank you, Fenris, I never expected such a change of attitude.“ Anders’ words may be sarcastic but his voice is raised, and the volunteers are exchanging glances and beginning to usher people quickly and quietly out of the clinic.

Fenris’ eyes flick towards the small exodus from the area before falling back on Anders. So his temper isn’t only reserved for occasional bouts around Hawke. Likely the best time to put the food down too or else something is going to get spilled, and of the things Fenris is going to risk a meal probably better than anything at The Hanged Man isn’t one of them. "That you’re an abomination has nothing to do with saving anyone.”

“So that’s all it comes down to. Not what I do, just what I am.” Anders’s expression hardens. "Fine, then. I am a mage, I am an abomination.“ He stands with arms folded, mouth closed but jaw working as he reaches for words to try and explain what he needs to, but it seems futile and pointless. He hangs his head, shaking it. "There really isn’t anything I can do, is there? Just for the way I was born I’m always going to be lower than the dirt under your … your unshod feet.”

Fenris is silent for a couple moments, for once uneasy to set the mage off but also growing colder in his expression. “I’m the last person you should be asking for acceptance. Any number of kind acts is a late condolence for what Tevinter and Danarius have done to me.”

“What -they- did to you, not -me-, not any of the mages in this city. Why are you holding me accountable for a crime I didn’t commit? What makes you so certain that if I had the chance, I would?”

It’s finally Fenris’ turn to raise his voice, sudden with his change of tone and small snarl. “Because I followed Danarius’ side long enough to see mages jump at the chance to 'be free’ in the Imperium when others are not. Because I’ve seen what you can be, and for all that you’re defending mages you willingly invited in a demon!”

“There’s a lot more to that than you know, and I need not answer to you! ” Anders pounds a fist into an open palm, glowering. "And as for what we can be? Maybe you haven’t seen -all- we can be. For every mage champing at the bit to be a Tevinter magister there are two or three or more who submit to the circle, or just try to bury their powers and hide and have a normal life! Your life showed you the worst of magic. But maybe you have yet to see the best!“

"You’re right, I have yet to see any of it past you. How many of those ‘two or three’ are blood mages? How many of them turn when cornered, or just turn into an abomination? How many people have to be hurt for you to be satisfied.”

“How many times do I have to try to help for -you- to be satisfied?” Anders shakes his head, coldness in his eyes giving way to hurt, to imploring. "Alright, really, what DO you want from us? From me? Believe it or not I have actually been -trying- to do right by you!“

Fenris falters and mutters something in Tevinter, for all his hate of it. "I don’t know. I’m sorry if you were under the impression that I would be easily won over. If you’re so frustrated, hate Danarius for ensuring that I know nothing else.”

“I didn’t think it would be easy!” Anders throws up his hands. "Just… possible! Maker knows with all you’ve been through, it could take a lifetime to put to rights, and you’ve got this way about you…“ Anders bites his tongue. It’s well past time for shutting up. "Since my clinic seems to have emptied out for a time, I can help you get back to Hightown if you want.”

For a moment he nearly keeps pushing, but with a heavy sigh Fenris slides from the edge of the bed to stand, though his hand has to grab the edge of the table to do it. Damn if Hightown didn’t suddenly seem so far. “A good idea, before we tear each others’ throats out. I doubt this was the rest you hoped for.”

“Patients usually do better with familiar surroundings,” Anders says with a hint of forced cheerfulness. "Actually I’m glad it turned out like this. Nobody should be out in Darktown alone, especially not in the shape you’re in.“ Anders leans in, thinking at first to offer a shoulder for Fenris to lean on. But instead, he just offers his arm. "Maybe we’ll run into Hawke. Aveline’s probably had time to tell him what happened.”

“I’d rather she not.” The words are mostly muttered to himself as Fenris lets go of the bed. For a few good steps he stubbornly ignores Anders’ attempt to help, but his unsteadiness quickly makes things harder until he’s forces to latch a hand against the Mage’s arm. “Personally I was hoping that we would be able to ignore that this ever happened.”

“Tomorrow is another day?” Anders ventures. And Fenris, for all his monstrous strength, doesn’t mass much, so Anders is ample support as they walk, slowly, out of the clinic and into the shaded quarry-roads of Darktown. “And aside from that, Hawke will do a better job of helping you forget your troubles than I will.”

“Hardly.” The emphasized word is punctuated with a small smirk, edging the corner of his lips barely a moment before he’s distracted by the fact that he looks weak in the middle of Darktown. Fenris’ eyes cast towards the shadows, though he realizes there’s no real point if he can’t defend against anything. “Hawke would bring cards with Varric, which would lead to drinking with Varric. I’ll take my chances with the abomination.”

“I’ve heard that even Hawke’s dog can play cards. Not sure if I believe it. But if it’’s true, I wonder if cats can learn to play…” The denizens of Darktown give Anders and Fenris plenty of room… they each have enough of a reputation that no one would antagonize them without a very good reason. Fairly soon, they reach the road out to Lowtown, sloping upwards toward the Hightown gates.

Fenris gives that a few moments of silent pause, but in the end there’s only one question forming in his mind that he can’t ignore. “Why cats?”

“I like cats. Not that it’s been my lifelong ambition to play cards with one. But I still miss having a cat.” Anders heaves a sigh without even realizing it. Ser Pounce-Alot is probably perfectly happy, catching mice and sleeping in sunbeams back in Ferelden. As for the hill, they take it slowly. It’s a pain in the ass even to people who haven’t recently been bleeding.

It’s the hill that really eats at Fenris’ efforts, but he still tries to hide it. Might have gotten away with it as a meandering slow stroll, if he wasn’t busy clinging onto the mage in a rather unromantic looking way. “So you’re one of those cat people. Do demons eat cats, or is there some other reason why you don’t have one?”

“The Wardens made me give him away. Said it wasn’t appropriate for me to be hiking around with a kitten in my knapsack.” Anders glowers a bit at the mention of eating cats, but it melts into a pout at the memory of his beloved Ser Pounce-Alot. “I keep putting milk out by the clinic door, but there don’t seem to be any stray cats in Darktown. Not something I like to speculate about too much.”

The elf manages a shrug. “Any animal starts to be fair game amongst the poor.” Just a fact he doesn’t seem particularly bothered by. It isn’t too soon when they finally reach his door, and he reaches forward with his free hand to pull it open. What, you thought he had a key? At least the place looks too ransacked already for any passing gang to make a try at stealing anything. Of course, the moment he has a chance at a near wall Fenris lets go of Anders as if he couldn’t back off fast enough. “I’m impressed, you didn’t shove me off a ledge while you had the chance.”

“Don’t make me re-think that,” Anders says dryly, picking his way through the debris of the ransacked manor. “If you’re -sure- you don’t want Hawke, Varric, and a deck of cards, are you going to be alright on your own?” Anders speaks a bit hesitantly, frowning inwardly. Fenris was hardly made of glass, even if he had taken quite a hit. Yet he’s fretting like a mother hen. He was fairly sure the elf couldn’t wait to be rid of him.

“No.” After a moment he’s quick to specify, “I’ll be fine. Even if the thought of you fetching them is amusing.” Amusing and awkward anyway, of all people not used to having anyone else ‘fetch’ something for him. Fenris glances away. “I.. suppose I should thank you.”

Anders blinks at hearing that. Though he had turned to show himself back out the door they’d entered by, he turns back to Fenris, eyebrows lifting. “No…” An unusual thing happens. Anders smiles, grinning widely, the expression far more dopey than smug. “I wouldn’t want you to break something internal. Rest well, and I’ll see you …when I see you.”

Fenris shoots a small glare at that, any danger of the elf smiling quickly averted. The look fades just as quickly as a small sound emanates from deeper inside the mansion, and he sighs as he pushes himself from the wall to head farther in. For what he’s been through, he hides the weakness well. “You have other strays to try saving, mage.” Before Anders can make up his mind about any of it Fenris heads in faster than he probably should, and sounds quite unimpressed. “Isabela, you’re not going to find anything.”


	2. Chapter 2

Fenris assumingly recovers well enough, hiding in his run down mansion like usual and just leaving it less often. Aveline must have stopped by at some point, because the next time everyone is out to knock around a gang and go for drinks later Hawke certainly doesn’t act like he knows anything. The elf seems okay, if very slightly slower.  
Nearly everyone manages to make it to The Hanged Man, and the crowd keeps Fenris from bothering a glance towards Anders for most of the night, if only because he’s too busy pointedly ignoring Isabela’s attention beside him.  
She finally drops her elbows to the table with a pout, and looks across the remaining group. “So Anders, I’m lonely tonight and Fenris is colder than the dead.”  
Fenris finally glances up at that. “Is that your way of asking if he’d make sure you’re clean these days?”

“Since when did that ever stop you?” Anders quips in reply to Isabela’s proposition. His gaze does wander a bit, though. Anders has had a few rounds, and his cheeks are rosy from the ale. “Oh, she generally just comes right out and asks,” Anders answers to Fenris. “I’m on the verge of trying a, er, ‘preventative healing’ approach and telling people she has that Blue Waffle sickness.”

“It won’t work, mage.” Not even alcohol can loosen that grumbly tagline. If anything, Fenris has been colder tonight, if that’s possible.  
“Why beat around my bush when being direct makes the itching go away, I say.” Isabela just smiles broadly as that causes the elf to lean away from her side by a couple inches, and doesn’t seem too phased by their comments or plans on fake illnesses. She’s too busy trying to win Anders over, because her options are quickly dwindling and the Rose costs money. “Pleaase? You’re like a two for one deal, and I have a feeling Justice never gets any.”  
“An abomination and a demon’s whore, the company I keep.”

“Two for one?!” Anders chokes on his drink, doing his best not to spray anyone with beer. “Isabela, I hate to disappoint but we’ve still only got one cock between us. And Justice is… he’s -Justice-, he’s not a Spirit of Getting It On.” Even halfway drunk, Anders is beginning to feel a certain chill in the air, and given that Fenris is involved, it would be far better if he himself weren’t. His gaze shifts toward the door as he tries to think of a way to extricate himself. “Look, Isabela, it’s… late. And I need to, um. I’ve got cleaning up to do back at the clinic. There was a round of food poisoning today and the whole place smells of vomit, it’s really -really- unpleasant…”

“Spirit of anything, a man has needs you know.” Isabela singsongs back, as if Anders didn’t. “All the more reason to stay. Don’t you have volunteers for the unimportant stuff?”  
Fenris’ eyes trail along Anders’ glance towards the door. “They likely do fine on their own.”  
For being a derisive comment, Isabela sure is delighted at that. “Can I watch? I can be quiet.”

Anders facepalms. “I’m just going to go. Now. Alone.” He pulls away from Isabela while simultaneously trying not to be in Fenris’s icy personal space. “Goodnight! Er, sweet dreams, both of you.”

Isabela visibly if cartoonishly wilts, and grabs for another drink while proclaiming that she’ll have to scrounge money to keep warm tonight unless the elf still wants to think about it. Or knows anyone. Anyone other than Varric.

It’s not long after Anders arrives back at the clinic when Fenris steps past the doorway from Darktown, this time with his sword in tow. “You’re either very fast or a terrible liar.”

Anders is hunched over his desk, scribing something under a dim pool of lamplight, when Fenris arrives. The sound of Fenris’s voice startles him, and immediately he can feel a rising burn of anger. He’d been trying to shrug it off, but the entire evening he’d felt like the elf was looking for a fight. "What?!“ He doesn’t have a witty comeback ready. He just kicks back his chair and stands, glaring. "What do you want with me? I told your girlfriend I wasn’t interested and for what little my word is worth with you, I meant it.”

Fenris perks up one eyebrow at that response, any suspicion he had on his face just aggravated. “What gives you the impression that I’m interested in her?” It’s not a question he actually wants answered, and he just continues as he walks closer to glance over the surroundings. “But she knows how to take no for an answer. Why would you bother lying?” Clearly if the clinic isn’t actually smelling like vomit, there’s a dastardly mage conspiracy going on that he needs to get to the bottom of.

Anders furrows his brow and scratches the back of his neck, obviously trying to figure out what Fenris is accusing him of. "Because I didn’t want to hurt her feelings.“ From the tone in his voice, he thinks that should have been obvious and he’s puzzled that it isn’t. "And because … it seemed to me like some kind of trouble was brewing between the two of you. I didn’t want to be in the middle of it. It’s none of my business, for one thing. And I don’t want to give you any -additional- reasons to kill me in my sleep.”

“You’re reaching for things that aren’t there. I left her to her own devices, but nobody else ever does.” Fenris only stops from the desk between them. As he glances down he feels a tinge of frustration from his inability to read whatever Anders was concentrating on, which only sets off his mood. “So give me a good reason why I shouldn’t think you’re hiding something instead, and throw you to the templars while I find out what it is.”

Anders crosses his arms over his chest, scowling. "I’m hoping the same reasons you haven’t already thrown me to the templars for being an apostate and an abomination will suffice.“ Something occurs to Anders, and Fenris’s threat irritates him enough that he decides to let it loose. "Did your Master do this sort of thing a lot? Punish you pre-emptively for things he thought you might have been thinking about doing?”

Fenris’ foul glare darkens to something far more dangerous. The elf pulls his sword as he crosses around the desk, anything on it immediately forgotten, and his lyrium blazes to life along his skin as he swings the flat of the blade towards Anders. “My actions are my own, /mage/!”

“Whelp!” Anders eyes blaze with Lyrium-glow, and the voice that comes from his throat turns booming and hollow, like thunder heard in the distance. A shell of magic , a bubble of intense pressure, forms around Anders, expands, and bursts. His desk splinters, and densely-scripted pages scatter over the clinic’s dusty floor. He doesn’t dodge; the force of his shield enough to stop Fenris’s sword dead. "Self-pitying brat! What value are your travails if they give you no compassion?! You are everything you accuse US of being… willing to do any vile thing to protect your freedom. WE have never begrudged you this, but you begrudge the same of US. Threaten US and WE -will- defend Ourselves.“

Fenris hisses behind his teeth as he pulls the dead weight of the sword back, at least having the sense to know better than try to keep attacking the shield before it’s dropped. As the point drops to rest a bit carelessly at his side, he raises an arm instinctively to protect his face from the debris. Being forced to idle drives him mad, so instead he blows off steam by yelling back. “I don’t need compassion to see you destroy half the room in your so called defense! Stand aside demon, you know nothing of me and this doesn’t concern you!”

“You see only what you want to see! Hypocrisy! Rampant Injustice… will ALWAYS concern ME.” The shield fades and Anders/Justice stands glowering, waiting for the next strike.

In an odd change as the shield vanishes Fenris lets go of the sword and lets it fall. Even against this floor the heavy weapon unleashes a weighty clang as it hits the ground, weight immediately resting where it lands. The elf abandons it to cross where the shield had once been, and roughly grabs for the collar of Anders’ clothes. Maybe he just intends to drag him to the circle bare handed. “Injustice only concerns you when it benefits you.”

Anders doesn’t retaliate. He stands there, feet planted, though Fenris certainly has the strength to force him to move. With one hand, he grips Fenris’s forearm in response to the grasp on his collar, and his icy eyes narrow. "Explain yourself.“

"What is there to explain!? That I’ve given up fighting you because you hide behind a demon, or that I find your simple presence agitating enough that you never give my mind peace?”

“Explain your accusation. That I concern myself with Justice only selfishly.” Justice’s hollow voice is softer now, and the grip on Fenris’s arm slackens. The look on his face is still made strange by the glow of magic in his eyes, but he looks no longer stony, or furious, but… stricken. "Tell me how I have failed.“

Fenris pauses in surprise at the sudden gentleness in place of the mutual arguing he was ready for. In a split moment the rage drains from his face, and he looks away. "Where is your justice if you risk everything and everyone to get it?”

Justice looks confused, and troubled. "But how can there be justice if we do not? How can there be justice if we give up?“ The blue glow fades, Justice retreating back into Anders’ mind to brood. He’s heard this before… nagging doubts in Anders mind, kind words from Hawke, but from Fenris, they take on new meaning. They give Justice something to think about. Anders is silently grateful that Fenris turns his face away, giving him time to rub and eerily cold tear from the lid of his eye.

The dimming glow from the corner of Fenris’ eyesight eventually pulls his gaze back towards the mage. The retreat should make him stop, but he just presses on and leans in while the demon isn’t actively there. His voice goes quieter, though not for lack of intensity. "How do you know freeing mages won’t make another Imperium? Do you think others around you get scared of turning into your collateral damage? Is Karl not enough for you to see that you need to stop?”

“Karl is enough to remind me why I -can’t- stop!” Anders voice is quiet but rough with emotion. "I don’t know what the cost will be, but I do know what it’s like to live under the threat of death, and what it’s like to see your lover made tranquil, a walking shell with everything burned out of them. Do you think he deserved that, just because he didn’t wish to be a slave?“

Fenris pauses again, his eyes softening to a bit of dared sympathy as the edge of his words cut sharper than he intended, for a topic he didn’t even intend. ”…Karl was your lover?“

Anders swallows, surprised by how tight his throat suddenly feels. He thought he had grieved his last, but the injury feels raw. His eyes sting. His chin tightens under his lip, and taking care not to move too fast, he turns away, shoulders rounded and head hanging. "At least… they had an excuse that time. They don’t always bother with one, when they Tranquil someone.“

Fenris’ grip on Ander’s clothes loosen, his hand gliding over the mage’s shoulder as he turns. "I’m not saying I always agree with their methods. But you’ve-” He cuts himself off, unable to keep berating at this point. “I’m sorry.”

“So am I.” Anders’ voice is still hoarse. He swallows again and wipes his eyes. The feeling of Fenris’s gauntlet on his back giving… just a touch, a kind touch… is somehow surprising and not, both at once. "You have given me a lot to think about. But then… you always do.“

Fenris’ hand lingers just a moment longer before it falls away. "I don’t see how.” He retreats before he does anything he thinks he’ll regret, turning and taking a few careful steps past the remains of the desk to find his sword. “What were you working on?” Notably past tense, now that it’s just a huge mess.

Anders sighs wearily as he crouches down, slowly gathering the scattered pages. "My manifesto. Just a lot of boring prat about how no just system can ever be based on oppression. It needed some serious revisions anyway.“ He looks up and over his shoulder, eyes dry enough for him to dare a glance back at Fenris. He feels a familiar tug at his heart, a tangle of unsaid things that refuses to resolve itself. "You know, it’s strange. He listens to you.”

What Fenris really wants to ask is why, but judging from Anders’ statement he wouldn’t get an answer out of either of them no matter how hard he tried. Surely neither of them think he’s right, what other reason is there? Reluctantly he drops it for now, for the only other thing bothering him. “Aren’t long winded manifestos typically for someone who doesn’t intend to live much longer?”

“Typically, I suppose.” Anders shrugs, still gathering up the parchments. A number of them have drawings in the margins, frequently doodles of cats. He straightens up, tapping the sheets of parchment into a neater pile. "But I wouldn’t worry. I have so much to live for, haven’t I?“

"No less than I do, with Danarius finding less interest in me of late. I’m just left chasing loose hopes.” Fenris stops himself, having crossed a invisible line and feeling too vulnerable than he’s comfortable with. His next words are abrupt: “I should go. You know where I am, if you need me.” He turns to leave just as hastily, grating against his mind for why he thought it would be right to add those last words.

“Fenris!” Anders shakes off some of the weariness that had settled over him, and barks the elf’s name. There’s no real anger behind it… it’s calculated just to make him pause in his hasty retreat and listen. "The same goes for you. You know where to find me, if you need me. Or even just…“ Anders leaves the sentence hanging. 'Want.’ He can’t say it. It’s far too close to home, to speak to Fenris about wanting. He simply shrugs, wearing an uncommonly unguarded smile. It makes him look younger, boyish.

Fenris predictably stops and half-turns back, unsure of how to respond to that smile beyond what too much alcohol for the night is telling him. "Or even just.. what, exactly?” Anything, anything witty that’ll make him roll his eyes and leave to avoid punching the mage, like always.

Anders blinks blankly for a moment, his entire train of thought derailing into nothing. He laughs, mainly at himself. It’s always good to be reminded that he’s still an idiot. “Don’t tell me you’re not dying to hang out with me and a bunch of sick refugees? If you’re ever terribly bored, and, er, you wanted to stop by, I wouldn’t -mind-, even though your place is probably nicer and I can’t afford wine. I do have milk, though, one of the refugees has a dairy cow, don’t ask me how she got it here…” Anders taps his index fingers together, his rambling getting progressively softer and softer until it’s a barely audible embarrassed murmur, his face red to the tops of his ears.

Fenris just stares as Anders fades into chatter, and sighs while he shakes his head halfway through. Yes, that dissolved any odd thoughts he was having perfectly well. “Goodnight, Anders.” He turns again, more determined to leave this time though at a less hurried pace, and idly adds over his shoulder. “I have wine, if you ever wish to avoid Isabela.”


	3. Chapter 3

Night has fallen in Kirkwall. For most people, this isn’t a time to venture out. There are plenty of gangs, Coterie thugs, and other freelance guttersnipes lurking in the narrow streets. But Templars generally keep a curfew, so for one apostate Mage, this is the best time to try hoofing it across town. Even so he’s relatively discrete, cloaked and hooded as he sets foot in Hightown, and he chooses to enter near the Blooming Rose’s boulevard, lit and populated even at night. Tawdry or not, the red paper lanterns are awfully pretty, and Anders smiles a bit at the sight before slipping back to the Hightown streets. When he finds the door to the derelict manor’s kitchen and pantry, he gives it a slightly muffled knock.

It takes a few moments but the door does open, and Fenris is silent a moment in his surprise. When you’re used to a dwarf stopping by, suddenly a mage seems all the taller. As he comes to his wits he steps out of the way. “Did The Hanged Man prove too much for you?” Even with the oddly peaceful end of their last meeting, he never expected Anders to actually take up the offer to stop by.

“Tonight, yes. And they don’t have that wine that Hawke’s been raving about. I was hoping you might pour me glass.” Anders gives a tentative, awkward smile. It occurs to him that ever since merging with Justice, he hasn’t smiled much. Which he’s given endless hours of thought to what the marge did to Justice, he’s rarely thought about how profoundly it altered him in turn. And it’s rare, also, to meet Fenris’s gaze without feeling like he was staring into a blast furnace that radiated pure hate. It feels strange, in a welcome way.

“The aggregio pavali? I’d be surprised if they ever did.” For once he doesn’t add a snide comment about it being from Tevinter, though he sure thinks about it. The table he was sitting at has a few bottles and glasses there, one bottle open alongside an idling deck of cards; with no need to keep things tidy, why not keep the things you need within reach. As long as the glasses beyond the one he’s using are clean, where’s the problem in convenience.  
…not that the same could be said about the far wall, with the splash of wine still staining it and shattered glass along the floor. How the hell does he navigate around that mess barefoot.  
Fenris sits back where he had been before the interruption, easily tipping the current bottle into a fresh glass. “I assume you have about as much coin as I do, running a free clinic.” Even the local tavern can feel rich when you’re broke.

That gets a dry chuckle from Anders as he steps carefully into Fenris’s shadowy abode, closing the door softly behind him and letting the iron latch fall into place. “Possibly less,” Anders confesses. “Healing people takes more than just magic, sometimes.” Linens, bandages, herbs… he’s had to find some creative ways of keeping the place clean and stocked. “Varric always offers to pick up my tab, so I’m not about to die of thirst,” he says with fondness in his voice. “But sometimes it’s better not to be somewhere public, when word’s going round the Templars are restless.”

“And here I have to gamble for my drinks with him.” After the somewhat lighthearted grumble Fenris refills his own glass, for once not aiming to shoot the entire bottle down, and takes a healthy drink from it before responding. “Are they? I suppose I should keep quiet about your nasty demon problem, then.”

“Oh come on, he’s not all that nasty as demons go. But all the same, if you don’t mention it around anyone in full plate armor I’d be just as happy.” Anders sits down, straddling the bench, and takes hold of the wine glass. He swirls it novicely before he takes a sip. “I don’t know much about wine, but this certainly -seems- fantastic.” He takes another sip, letting it linger in his mouth before he swallows. It does seem to lend itself to a different style of drinking than the ales and meads he’s more used to.

“Mm, you can say that but I seem to recall an incident with your desk.” Fenris watches Anders a moment with a tiny smirk, but quickly hides it with another far less classy gulp. “Tell me. Is it ever awkward? Having someone there all the time.”

Anders lowers his head a shrugs. “You kind of get past that part fairly fast. And there aren’t very clear delineations now. It would be awkward, but also so much easier if there were… if I could just divide my mind and we could each stay on our own side of the line. As if my soul were the Apprentice Quarters.” Anders shakes his head, snorting at the absurdity of that. “He really wasn’t so bad. Spirits are pure. Even the bad ones are pure in their motivations and their intentions. People aren’t. We’re tangled messes. Usually people think of spirits corrupting people into abominations. I think…I’ve done the opposite.” Anders frowns, having slipped deeply into Serious Business talk without having intended to. He slams back the rest of his glass of wine, chugging once and then wiping at the corner of his mouth. “Anyhow, there’s only so coy you can be with another consciousness in your head. When you need to pee, you need to pee.” Anders brightens again, remembering Justice nearly being overwhelmed by the sensuality of having even basic bodily functions. If had been one of the few things from that first day that had given him something to laugh about.

Fenris is quick to pour the mage’s glass full again the moment it touches the table. “I can’t imagine you corrupting anyone.” Oh maker, he’s going to need to keep drinking if he’s going to say things like that. Or stop while he’s ahead, but that will just leave him embarrassed as besotted words fall out of his mouth, so he pours for himself too and knocks down half the glass on the spot. “Then, I also can’t imagine what possessed you to become an abomination in the first place.”

Anders snerks at the pun, taking the glass up with a bit of a bemused look on his face. Was that Fenris saying something… sweet? It isn’t just the wine putting color in his cheeks. “It’d be easier to explain if you’d known him before. I suppose I should tell you about Amaranthine and that whole business if you really want to know.” He drinks deep, but takes the time to savor. The wine feels warm and smooth in his throat when he swallows. It has a heat more like good liquor, but without the attendant harshness.

Fenris is quick to wave a hand at that. “Later, when I have more of my wits to listen to the details.” It sounds like a simple truth more than a brush off, though Fenris interested in any details the mage would have to say is surprising enough, even if delayed. “I was surprised enough that he didn’t kill me when he had the chance.”

“He–We– really don’t want you dead, Fenris.” Anders’ brow knits at that, and he holds out his hands, palms up, in confirmation of some kind of truce. “You deserve to see justice done, someday, for what has happened to you in your life. You deserve the chance to make it happen. I don’t have the right to take that from you.”

Fenris pauses his drinking, then sighs heavily at that, tipping his chin down towards his glass. “Funny, I hadn’t had the same opinions about you.” With a subtle past tense thrown in there. He glances up, barely meeting Anders’ gaze past his brow. “I still think you’re too dangerous to be left alone.”

“Then… don’t leave me alone.” Anders tries to smile, but there’s too much earnestness in his words.

“I don’t intend to.” Fenris half-stands in his sudden reach to catch Anders’ wrist, cementing the wine glass to the table as he leans in and roughly presses their lips together. It’s practically enough to catch even him off guard, but the elf blows any concern out of his mind rather easily. At worst they got horribly drunk, and Anders would forever be cold to him for doing such a thing. It would almost be an improvement, instead of this maddening half-kindness.

Anders isn’t cold. His lips press back, his silent gasp sucking in some taste of Fenris’s wine-soaked breath. His free hand rests on the back of Fenris’s silver-haired head, and his body arches to press deeper into the kiss. His lips are firm and warm and eager, his mouth inviting, and his head set spinning by a euphoria that doesn’t come from wine.

Fenris parts his lips, his tongue passionate in it’s search to meet the mage’s mouth fully. With the strong encouragement he’s ready to take this a lot farther than the simple kiss he’d initially, hastily, intended, and he shivers at a firm but wanting touch against his body that his skin can’t even remember feeling. Even still, his hand leaves Anders’ wrist just to catch the other one at his head, allowing it to linger caught a couple short moments before brushing it away. And freed he reluctantly breaks them, looking down as he feverishly starts to unbutton those damned clothes.

Anders is almost panting, his chest rising and falling under his heavy robes. He doesn’t resist as Fenris pushes his hands away, but he grips the edges of the bench until his fingernails gouge the wood. His clothes come away, layer by layer, and Anders apparently wears a lot. Finally the thin linen of his undershirt comes open, giving Fenris a clear look at Anders’ throat and chest. Lower down, there’s a glint of patina’d metal, some kind of pendant hanging from a leather thong around Anders’ neck.

Somewhere in the middle of disrobing him Fenris couldn’t handle being farther than inches apart for so long, and leaves his hands to work blindly while his lips find the softer space along the front of Anders’ throat. He’s too eager to tease their touch, sucking and kissing at the skin hungrily, until he finally works open the last shirt. His knuckles graze bare chest and a spot of cold metal, the latter of which not really registering until Fenris pulls away again to look at what he’s been laboring after. Just as abruptly as this had all started he freezes, gaze going cold as he looks up. “Give me a good reason to not kill you.”

“Wh-what?” Anders voice is soft, confused, by the sudden coldness. And then he looks down, and remembers. He hadn’t even given the pendant a thought in days, he was so accustomed to wearing it. He looks back up, his face drawing into an anguished look at the thought of what that symbol might mean to Fenris…his mouth moves but no words come, and he wonders if he’s just found a new, quieter way of ending his life in atonement for what he’s done to Justice. He can’t look Fenris in the eye and say he deserves to live. Yet, when he looks into those eyes, for the first time since his possession, he -wants- to. “Because I’m in love with you.”

Fenris just stares for a moment, lyrium flashing an intense glow as he’s overwhelmed by his emotions and the mixed signals. The best, only conclusion his mind can draw is a wild notion that someone was sent to get close to him only to stab him in the back when he finally starts to trust. It sounds like something bizarrely cruel enough that his old master would think it up. His hand quickly shoots from Anders’ chest to his throat, tightening just to the point of being uncomfortable as he snarls. “You think I’m that much of a fool? Tell me the truth.”

Anders doesn’t so much as raise a hand to fight back. “That is the truth,” he rasps, his chin lifted, his eyes still on Fenris. The fury, the suspicion, the fear, the hurt he sees in the elf’s face… it begins to sink in that he caused it this time. “I don’t think you’re a fool. I can’t look you in the eye and tell you ‘I’m a good man, I deserve to live.’ I don’t. I’m at your mercy.” As for what Fenris suspects him of, he’s still in the dark. He thinks this is merely the usual, old enmity made raw again. His shoulders slump, a dull emptiness stealing into his eyes. “I’m ready,” he says wearily.

The words really don’t match up with the story Fenris has already determined on, but while he wishes nothing more than to kill every mage that welcomes it, he can’t find it in himself to, this time. In an small yell of frustration he stands and shoves Anders roughly to the floor.. not exactly the death anyone had in mind, that. The elf takes a little bit more space between them, wariness adding to his visible turmoil that the mage might lash out if some plan has been dragged into the open, and he points accusingly. “No, I want you to explain yourself first. Justice, if you can’t manage it.” In the chaos he can’t imagine why he’d trust a demon at this point, but somehow feels Justice would have nothing to lose in simple truth, if Fenris really isn’t a threat.

Anders rolls on the floor, his arms raised to guard his face, his body curling like someone who expects to be pummeled and kicked. He pushes himself up on his elbows when no blows rain down and looks at Fenris, confused. He’s about to tell Fenris he can’t simply call Justice up at will, when a rush of cold rips through him and blue light ignites in his eyes. “He has already told you the truth as he sees it. ”

Instead of beating on anyone Fenris had nearly started to pace from his agitation, but Justice’s takeover stops him and at least momentarily silences his mind. “Explain that accursed thing on his neck, if he’s not from Tevinter.”

“A gift, from Hawke. Found on the body of one of the slavers who died in pursuit of you.” Justice pulls him/Andersself off the floor, straightening his posture and then his robes. He has a dignity about him that Anders tends to lack. “Hawke intended it as a reminder that not all men, given power, will choose to use that power to oppress. Anders enjoys it mainly for the transgressiveness of even possessing such a thing in this land.”

Fenris growls back, “The oppression isn’t gone, they just displaced it. Get out.”

Justice narrows his eyes, advancing on Fenris slowly. “I am not yours to summon and banish at will. You have called me and now you will hear me out.”

The settling glow flares to life again with Fenris’ rage. “You will take him and leave, or I will do my best to kill you both.”

“YOU WILL HEAR ME OUT.” Justice thunders, his own power flaring coldly though Anders’ skin. “You have berated me for lives that I would risk and yet you threaten again and again to take the life of one who will not raise a hand against you! I hope you have not found freedom from your cruel Master only to become a slave to Hate. Now know this: Whether you wish it or not, whether you take up your sword or not. You hold Anders’ life in your hands. Consider that.” A final flare of blue light, and Justice turns to stalk from the room.


	4. Chapter 4

It’s beyond the wee hours and into late morning/midday when Fenris has had enough pacing and agitating about in his mansion. He has to get out of there, not only because the mage might come back. Can’t face him right now, just… can’t. So he heads for The Hanged Man in a ball of snappy nerves. When he enters the pub he shoots an overly cautious glance around the main room, and only continues in when it’s abundantly clear that Anders isn’t there. Only the people that practically call the place home, people who can’t afford a better meal and the most harmless and lost of drunks that only leave long enough to get more money. With any luck, he fully intends to locate a secluded corner table and just settle with the last group for the day and into the night. However long it takes for him to shake this off.

“Fenris!” Among the people who practically call the Hanged Man home is one voluptuous Pirate Lady. She sees the elf stalk into the common room from her usual spot by the bar. Motioning for a pair of fresh ale mugs, she bounds over to Fenris with a knowing grin on her face. “I hear -somebody- got -lucky-,” she says, putting an arm around his shoulders and nudging him towards an empty table. “I’ll pick up your tab tonight if you tell me -all- about it. EVERY juicy little thing, you hear me?”

As soon as he hears his name called out Fenris gives Isabela a look to silently tell her not now. But of course, whenever it’s that sort of a mood he usually needs her most or else he’ll explode with pent up anger. As nice as walls look with broken bottles of wine on them…  
From experience he doesn’t otherwise fight her approach, just taking a mug and knocking back as much as he can in one shot before he sits down. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“I think you do. A little bird told me you decided that fabulous two-for-one deal was too good to resist.” Isabela rests her elbows on the table and gives Fenris a winsome smile. "But while you do have that diffuse storminess about you of a man who hasn’t slept much, you don’t look nearly as satisfied as you ought to.“ Isabela pouts. It could be there are no juicy details to extort just yet. "So what stopped you? I’m sure he didn’t turn you down.”

Fenris just takes another swig of ale, though less so this time while he watches her from the corner of his eye. Finally he sets it down with a sigh, dropping his head in defeat. There really was no point in denying it, was there. “A mage and I’d been drinking, I don’t see why you’re surprised nothing happened. Leave it.” Of course, the moment that falls from his mouth he realizes it just makes the event sound more interesting, and he’s likely doomed to tell her details anyway. As if he wasn’t already. So he adds while he’s ahead, “He was wearing an amulet from Tevinter.” She can guess how he figured that one out.

“Oh…” Isabela’s voice is soft and she slumps a bit out of sympathy. "I’m sorry, Fenris.“ She takes a deep drink from her own mug, swallows, then sighs. "I’m here if you want to talk,” she says. "And if you don’t, I still think you should, so out with it. What happens now?“

Fenris glances out to the rest of the pub, a mix of not wanting to look at her, his agitation riling up and his half expectation of Anders to come waltzing in. “Justice made it clear that it was a gift from Hawke and his life rests on what I decide. Either I leave him to his own end or I bed with someone I can’t stand to touch me.” 

Isabela blinks at that, and then downs another swig of ale. It’s a lot to take in. "Not that I’m saying I agree, but you’ve never had a problem with the whole ‘leaving him to his own end’ thing in the past. But I’ve been getting the impression there’s -something- between you for a while now, and not just hatred. You know he sneaks glances at you when he thinks you won’t notice?”

Fenris shoots her a mildly horrified glance, and decides he needs to keep chugging the ale. He’s nothing if not a heavy drinker when he needs to be, and right now he really, really needs to be drunk. The empty mug is set back on the table with a hollow clunk, and he waves someone down absently to bring another. “He said he loved me.” So really, any talk of obsessed glances his way shouldn’t be a surprise.

Isabela snorts, waving the serving girl over for another pair of drinks. "I think you may well be the last to know. What I’m wondering is how you feel about all this.“

“What should I be feeling?!” The bark and split second lyrium flicker makes the approaching girl jump, even if she’s relatively used to his outbursts. “I hate him for doing this to me. I hate him for being a mage. And I can’t stop thinking about him.”

Isabela doesn’t flinch at Fenris’s flaring temper, but finishes her ale and hands the serving girl her empty mug. Fenris’s words elicit a quiet, understanding “Ah.” For a few moment’s she’s silent, obviously thinking. Telling Fenris that this very well fits the definition of being “crazy” about the mage would get her nowhere, and probably just make him stalk off angrily. "And you said you can’t stand him even touching you?“

“My skin remembers the agony too well. It would be the same to let wasps crawl on me.“ Just waiting for the assumed sting is half the pain. Fenris drags over the fresh ale, taking another swig as the feeling faintly washes over him just thinking about it.

"Mmmmh..” Isabela nods. "Then this is something you’ll have to face with anyone… assuming you don’t plan to live your whole life alone and totally unmolested, which would be a terrible waste.“ Her eyes glint with mischief. "But how do you feel about touching -him-, I wonder…”

“I don’t have to state the obvious.” No amount of fishing is going to make him give details about how he wants to touch every last damn inch of that man, but his moment of distant silence probably tells it for him. He clears his throat before his imagination continues that track. “Only mages. Don’t think you can chase me away by touching me.”

Isabela grins broadly. “I wouldn’t dream of trying,” she says in that tone of voice that suggests she was planning exactly that. “As for -your- intimate difficulties, it’s nothing you can’t fix with a little erotic bondage and a lot of patience, I suspect.” Her tone remains obnoxiously cheerful.

Fenris just keeps drinking for all her cheer, but doesn’t seem worse for her mood at least. “Everything would be so much easier if I just had you around, wouldn’t it.” Around, because that’s the word he’ll use these days for ‘fucking’.

Isabela shrugs. “If love were easy I wouldn’t be -nearly- so enamored with casual sex, my friend.” She leans back in her seat, smiling at Fenris with a wistful “you’re so lucky” kind of expression. “It’s awkward, uncomfortable, difficult, and maddening. And you had better thank the maker it’s happening to you.”

“He can take it back.” Fenris tips his mug with solid determination, acting like he’s dying of thirst before setting the half-drained ale down. “Did you want to?”

Isabela echos Fenris’s words back to him: “I don’t have to state the obvious. Shall I get us a room?”


	5. Chapter 5

The clinic is closed. Apparently even Anders’ various helpers have been told to go home, or at least elsewhere. The place is dark, and Anders himself is elsewhere. After leaving Hightown the previous night, he hadn’t slept, had barely even rested before taking to the streets again. His wanderings have taken him down to the docks, where mostly everyone is too busy to notice him huddling in his cloak and staring out at the sea from a secluded spot under one of the piers.

Somehow Varric manages to find him, but then that’s just the dwarf’s way, nothing without connections. At least he’s brought a bottle along with him, and something strong by the looks of it. Without an explanation how he stops at Anders’ side, tsking out towards the water. “Now what are you doing all the way out here, blondie.” 

“Nothing.” The sniffle and rub of the eyes that follows make clearer than words just what Anders has been doing. He reaches for the neck of the bottle.

 

Varric freely offers the bottle up for him to take it. Thought as much, from what he’d heard. “Oh Blondie, don’t tell me that pretty elf dumped you already. Want me to rough him up for you?”

Anders un-stoppers the bottle and drinks as deep as he can before gasping for air. “Yes and no. It’s my fault… it’s all my stupid, miserable fault.”

Varric settles his back against a nearby pier beam. “What did you do, look at him funny?”

“I forgot about the Tevinter Chantry amulet Hawke gave me. I was wearing it under my clothes. The second he saw it I just went right back in the bag with all the other corrupt, evil, horrible mages. I’m surprised he didn’t kill me. I… I wish he had.” Anders hands the bottle back to Varric, settling with his arms loosely around his knees.

“Well don’t drown yourself yet, every day he doesn’t kill you is another day you can try.” Varric smirks as he takes a much smaller tip of the bottle. “Now I don’t mean to sound critical, but you know who you’re trying to take the pants off of, right?”

Anders looks sidelong at Varric, his expression brightening marginally. Clearly he hadn’t thought of it that way. “But… you dodn’t see the look on his face. He was so… hurt.” Anders slumps forward again, head down. “When I saw that in his eyes I felt like I -belonged- in that bag, with all the corrupt, evil, horrible mages. How do I fix this? How do I even convince him to give me a second chance?”

“So you’re a bad horrible person. That’s never stopped anyone.” Varric very carefully taps the top of Anders’ head with the bottle, then reaches to set it down beside him. Drink up, kiddo. “My point is, even if you weren’t, he’s not exactly some shy farmgirl you can sweep off her feet to bed. If you’re quitting over something like this already, it’s never gonna work. He weighs more than that, for one thing.”

Anders sniffles again, but picks up the bottle for another long drink. “You really think persistence will make a difference?” He looks up to Varric, the question genuine. “You really think this isn’t just… doomed?”

Varric shrugs. “It might be, but you won’t know until you try. If that still doesn’t work he’ll likely never find anyone, because I can’t see anyone else putting up with as much as you’re willing to. Just keep trying until he actually tells you it’s over.” Varric stops himself there. “Did he?”

Anders stops and thinks about it. Then he shakes his head. “No. I’m not sure we uh, formally acknowledged ‘it’ had begun, though. Maybe there’s a commonlaw thing about kissing that applies.” He looks up to Varric with a hint of a smile.

“That’s the spirit. Not over ‘til the fat lady sings. And hey. It’s not like he killed you for kissing him, and you’re a mage. Sounds like you have some sort of advantage already, if your heart’s still on the inside.”

“Actually, he kissed me…” Anders’ cheeks begin to flush at the memory, and he takes another drink. He replays that memory in his head, for good measure, and then he begins to grin like an idiot. “He -kissed- me, Varric!”

“Then what are you crying here about, Blondie? Let the pretty elf have some space, he’s not used to playing nice and sharing.”

Anders sits back, still grinning from ear to ear. “You always give the best advice, Varric.” He takes another drink. For the first time in years, he begins to feel like life is good.


	6. Chapter 6

The city is at best a tightly controlled chaos: full of screams, the stone walls heating from the fires like an oven, the smoke choking lungs and burning the eyes, blood congealing into the dirt, and the coolly coordinated actions of the Qunari orchestrating it all. Kirkwall’s forces seem so caught by surprise that the fight may well be over before it begins. While scattered, disorganized fights happen across the city, more and more Qunari are beginning to herd scared citizens together to sort them by usefulness.

 

As much as he hates to admit it, a small part of Fenris admires the force as Hawke leads their group through the battle to see the Arishok. Stand together and stomp intimidatingly, and Kirkwall just seems to fall apart into a mass of disoriented ants. It seems like some miracle that they’ve lasted this long, or maybe they’ve just grown soft from the impenetrable walls. Once inside the palace the war outside becomes muted and distant in exchange for a quieter terror.  
Even while Hawke uses Fenris as a cultural translator with the Arishok the elf can’t help but feel a tugging of distraction. With Justice there seems to be little reason to worry, but it doesn’t stop him from wondering where Anders is. He knows what the Qunari do with mages, and none of the options are kind. At one point Fenris had agreed with the measures the Qun took, but now things feel… different, and it leaves him uneasy.

There’s a drone of voices somewhere in the background, but it could as well be miles away to Anders. His mind can’t move beyond the frightened, quaking breathes of the other mages, bound as he is, gagged as he is. The Qunari guard them vigilantly, even the eyes of the Saarebas hold no sympathy for them. The Mages are being kept separate from the other captives, the other ‘Bas’, as they are not merely useless things, but dangerous, and as they have lived outside the Qun, with no Arvaraad, almost certainly corrupted. Now and again, one of the Qunari looks over the balustrade into the main hall of the palace below, where the deep voice of the Arishok and another voice… something that tugs at Anders’ consciousness … debate and negotiate.  
A Saarebas and his Arvaarad patrol back and forth along the line of bound mages, the Saarebas placing his hand on the forehead of each mage in turn, checking their reserves, draining them utterly. Anders struggles when they reach him, glaring up into the eyes of his captors, teeth sawing at his gag, but compared to one of the Qunari guards, he has about as much strength as a child. The Saarebas drains him, keeping Justice locked in fitful slumber. A solid thunk, and Anders shifts his gaze to a cylinder of embellished iron the Qunari set upon the floor. Catches are unlatched, a havy lid pulled free, and his nose catches a sharp scent, almost familiar. Most of the words the Qunari exchange he does not know, but he hears the word “qamek” and feels as if the bottom falls out of his stomach. He begins to struggle against his manacles until they cut into him.

The Qunari standing nearest to Anders mutters a pointed, “Bas Saarebas, maraas imekari.” but otherwise ignores his struggles, confident that there’s nothing the mage can do. They turn their attention to the first in the line of prisoners, woman that could almost pass as Bethany’s younger twin. One of the guards drops the flat of his sword against the back of her knees, nothing more than a rough tap but with their strength it makes her easily fall to her knees. She’s almost too terrified and confused to move, eyes wide and frantic as they move the cylinder towards her. Carefully a smaller flask is detached from the back, reverent words recited as the qamek is poured and the main cylinder capped again. The agitation to the liquid stirs the smell into the air, chemically sweet almost to the point of being putrid as it’s brought closer to the waiting line. The process seems practically designed to instill fear, foolishly slow save for the fact that they’ve probably never had reason to rush this.  
Finally the guard covering the first mage leans down to pull off the gag and hold her head in place. The woman immediately starts screaming, a shrill screech of horror cut off as the neck of the bottle is shoved into her mouth. The Qunari’s stonelike hands cover her jaw to keep her mouth closed, and they simply wait while she decides to either drink or drown. With a choked gargle and a jerk, her instincts kick in to swallow.

Hawke and the Arishok had turned to walk down the steps, the Qunari and captives clearing the space for the duel as they hear the scream. The nobles are too scared for their own lives to really take notice and the Qunari ignore what’s obviously happening, leaving only Hawke’s party surprised at the sound as they look up. Fenris almost instantly recognizes the process, stomach falling as he sees who’s there.  
“ANDERS!”  
…It’s Hawke who calls out, his voice seemingly enough to silence the entire war for a moment, and it’s enough to kickstart Fenris’ mind into stepping forward and calling up to the Qunari there. “Karataamkost! Pashaara!” Hopefully enough to make them stop anyway, until he can think an escape out of this.

Anders’ head jerks up at the sound of his name. His eyes fix on the familiar face below, on Fenris’s wide and intense eyes. But at the sound of the mage-girl choking, coughing as she swallows qamek, his gaze turns, the whites of his eyes showing, horror and anguish and sympathy all coming to life in his features. He shakes his head as if begging for it not to be happening, not to be real.  
By the time Fenris calls for them to stop, Anders has been forced to his knees, not by a slap of a blade or spear–haft, but hands clamped vicelike on his shoulders. An Arvaraad and his Saarebas are close at hand, watching him, that and the dried blood caking one side of his head giving evidence to the struggle he put up when he was captured. The others they suspect are corrupted. But this one, they know without a doubt.

Even before they pull the flask from her the mages’ eyes flutter back open to a dead stare, glancing around but focusing on nothing beyond a mild confusion as to why a cold metal nozzle is forced in her throat. As they pull it away to turn back to the main cylinder she just hangs there with her mouth hanging open, saliva from her struggle glistening and forgotten on the edges of her lips. Blank.  
With the end result in front of them the other mages start struggling anew, but the Qunari are used to that response and pay it no real mind. One of their number, however, half turns back to watch Fenris. He can’t imagine anything the bas could say and the process isn’t going to be immediately called off without reason, but it’s curious enough that an elf this far south knows their language to pay attention.  
“Hope you know what you’re doing, broody.” Everyone with a bow aims for the group of Qunari around Anders, but Varric’s the one to let a bolt fly and hit the far wall, just to make sure they’re listening. It’s enough to make the Arishok pause, if calmly, and watch the commotion.  
Which leaves Fenris in the spotlight, and he can only think of one thing. It’s a stretch, but he takes another commanding step forward to seperate himself from the small crowd near Hawke.  
“Parshaara! I am Arvaraad to the Bas Saarebas, return him to me at once!”

Anders isn’t sure what Fenris is doing, or trying to do. But he hears the twang of Bianca’s string and the whistle and clack of a crossbow bolt close by. He sees Fenris looks as intense as he ever has, committed to whatever course of action he’s chosen, and it begins, dimly, to dawn that these people, his friends, aren’t going to let this happen to him.  
The Arvaarad guarding the mages steps toward the banister, looking down upon the party while keeping his stature straight and aloof. “Since when do Basra Saarebas have Arvaarad? We found this one running wild, without collar or muzzle. Where are his bindings, Arvaarad? The evil he harbors is great in its breadth and its depth.”

For a sharply cold moment Fenris draws a blank at the question, and while he doesn’t visibly falter the realization of Justice’s words becoming suddenly very direct and literal chill him. “It is as you say.” Fenris gestures a hand back towards Hawke, hoping they heard the Arishok minutes earlier. “The Basalit-an believes the ways here are too soft. He was taken from his pen during the attack. Maaras shokra.”

“The Basalit-an sees true. He would not choose an Arvaarad who was not equal to the task this bas presents.” The Arvaarad nods and crosses his arms, satisfied with the answer. The other Qunari take this as a signal to heave Anders back to his feet. “Go to your keeper, Saarebas,” the Arvaarad says, dispassionate but without malice. Anders still feels his cheeks burn in humiliation, that he dare not do otherwise. The guards release him but watch him closely as he makes his way, slow and sore, to the stairs and down them. Soon he stands with the party, his head hung, tangled hair half hiding his battered face.

Fenris tries not to sigh in relief as he stiffly watches Anders released, and as soon as he’s near the elf reaches back to catch a firm grip on his bindings. With a quiet nod from Hawke, he turns them towards the door to lead them out. “Ebost Saarebas.” There’s a bit more commotion as Hawke demands the Arishok hold the mages until the duel is over, but Fenris has already stretched his words and anything else would sound like bleating. And frankly, he doesn’t care what else happens there as soon as the doors close behind them. Instead of just fleeing out the front of the palace back into the chaos he takes them down a side corridor with stern silence, and finds someone’s obscurely located office to sidestep into. Finally he releases his grip on Anders’ bonds, and reaches up to undo his gag.

Anders is the portrait of obedience as Fenris ushers him out the door. He would lift his head for one last look at the other mages, if not for knowing that he’d end up having to do something, something regrettable, something that would disrupt the brittle tension in that room. Today, he’s nobody’s savior. He raises his head, when they’re alone, looking at Fenris with a mixture of perplexity and gratitude in his eyes. He finally spits out the gag, red weals left on his cheeks from how tightly it had been tied, and he sucks in a deep breath through his mouth. 

Fenris is silent a moment, half expecting something from either of them. When nothing immediately happens he glances away to walk behind the mage and begin to undo the rather complex knots the Qunari reserve for tainted mages. “Hawke won’t let them die.”

“I know.” Anders’ voice is hoarse. He looks back over his shoulder as Fenris works his wrists free, something probably complicated by the knots being wet with fresh blood. He fumbles after something to say, but words fall far short. He isn’t sure a word has been invented that could describe how he feels at the moment. But in the end he decides even a feeble venture is better than nothing spoken at all. “Thank you, Fenris… ”

And for all his strength Fenris is silently cursing that between his sword and his bare hands it’s never occurred to him to try acquiring a knife. The rest of their group had always had enough to spare between them it was never a problem. His hands, that had been giving tiny jerks across Anders’ wrists as he works the knots free, pause at the words for several long seconds. At least Anders can take comfort in the fact that Fenris isn’t quick to his words either. “Had they done anything yet?” Besides the obvious beating into submission.

Anders shakes his head. “Not to me. They forced qamek into that girl…” His face draws tight with sympathy. “Others, they couldn’t subdue cleanly so they killed them. Circle mages, all of them, scared to death and without a Templar in sight. It was a nightmare.” His hands being freed makes it even harder to keep himself in check. He trembles with that effort, not to lift a hand, not to touch Fenris. Not to kiss him. “I am… so deeply in your debt…”

“Don’t.” With the ropes dropped away Fenris circles the mage. “I couldn’t bear the thought of you becoming one of those dead things I’ve seen too much of.” His hands gently find the edges of Anders’ jawline, and pulls him into a careful kiss.

The kiss just about steals Anders’s breath away, He closes his eyes and leans into it, closing his lips against Fenris’s and giving a gentle tug. If he can’t touch with his hands, he can touch with his lips, at least, and he lets them brush against Fenris’s jaw and cheek, substituting a warm and bristly nuzzle for an embrace.

Fenris leans against the touch, for once feeling content as he draws his arms across Anders’ shoulders. Well, one can hug for the both of them. “I’m sorry, I was a coward..”

“And I was an idiot. I’m sorry too.” Anders rests his chin on Fenris’s shoulder and just… rests. Tension seeps out of his body. He still has cuts and bruises, but he feels safe, purged of all the horror of the day, and assured that all the damage done, can mend.

Fenris sighs very faintly, inaudible save for the fact that his lips are alongside Anders’ ear. “We can’t stay here.” He hates it but it’s true, a wrecked mage and a single ex slave wouldn’t last long against any patrolling number of Qunari. Reluctantly he pulls away, hands sliding over Anders’ shoulders as they separate to approach the window warily and look out. He’d only intended a quick glance, but he stops. “They’re leaving.”

“Hawke,” Anders breathes the name along with a relieved sigh. “He won. Maker, I hope he’s not too badly hurt.” Anders begins pushing his hair back out of his eyes, trying to tie it back up in the usual way. “We should see if we can help. My magic is drained but I’m still on my feet…”

“No.” Well that was a quick definitive answer. Fenris turns back. “I’m taking you away from this place.” Hopefully that means he just has that much faith in Hawke being okay, though really that would be fair enough. “Let’s go before the Qunari are gone and the templars find their wits enough to gather the circle again.”

Anders considers arguing, but it only takes a look at Fenris’s face to tell him that’s a stupid idea right now. So he falls in step beside the elf. “Fair enough.” He adjusts his robes and rolls his shoulders, joints popping. “Even my bruises have bruises. I think I’m going to take a nice vacation, starting now.” He smirks a bit, a vague sense of the rather drained and exhausted Justice grumbling about sloth in the back of his mind.

As they leave some cheers are heard from deeper in the palace. Well, sounds like Hawke’s doing well enough without them. Still Fenris turns to leave out the nearest side entrance, not willing to risk certain Qunari seeing him and wondering why the mage has even less restraints on. “A pity you’ll be able to heal them soon enough, while the rest of us endure the old fashioned way.”

Anders actually sticks out his tongue at that. “I’ll heal the rest of you tomorrow, if Merrill hasn’t already taken care of it. Right now I couldn’t heal a paper cut.” He sticks close to Fenris, even clasping his hands behind his back when they’re anywhere they stand a chance of being seen by the withdrawing Qunari. It occurs to him to give Fenris a closer looking-over, but he notices nothing beyond the usual splatters of Other Peoples’ Blood. “You weren’t inured, were you?”

To be truthful he took a rough strike to the stomach, but while he can feel the large bruise forming already he’s confident that none of the blood is his. And bruises are just something to be ached over until they go away.  
Sigh. “Mages.” Now that the crisis is averted, the elf can get back to his usual hate.  
Still, he’s thankful for the fact that this time his mansion is just around the corner, and soon enough pulls open the door with the hope that nobody had any bright ideas about looting during the invasion.

“I know, right?” Anders can’t help himself. As for Fenris’s mansion, it’s clear that if any looters opened the door, they assumed the place had already been hit and left again. Anders steps over the usual debris as they enter, feeling like he could almost go utterly limp in relief when the door shuts behind them.

“The Qunari didn’t beat enough life out of you.” For once he bothers to latch the door and pointedly leads the way to one of the only areas he actually bothers with in the entire place. “There’s still running water upstairs.” With the fire he usually leaves simmering day in and out, it’s probably hot too.

“I was about to ask about that,” Anders says gratefully. “If you’d like to beat me further out of my wits you’re welcome to, as long as I get to be in a hot bath while you do it.”

Fenris detours them to the bathroom, which is possibly the cleanest room of the entire place. But then, it was left like that and Fenris would only be in here long enough to scrub the blood off. When he turns the knob for the hot water it churns and chugs a few seconds before water starts filling the mansion-oversized tub. Sounds like cold water gets a bit more use around here.  
He straightens and pauses, momentarily uncharacteristically flustered. “I could..go..” Not that he wants to, but when not in an explosion of passion he’s momentarily unsure of how normal people go about this.. romance thing.

Anders blinks twice as he’s in the process of unfastening his robes. He’s already kicked off his boots, and he’s standing on the stone-tiled floor in stocking feet. "Don’t?“ Anders’ tone is almost joking, but then his brows draw together, his hazel eyes turn imploring. "I’d like not to be alone right now.” Never mind how he feels about taking his eyes off Fenris at the moment.

Without a real response to that Fenris looks down and upturns his arms to unlatch his gauntlets with a couple clicks on each, followed by a small clatter as he slides them off and sets them on the stone counter. He takes a couple steps forward, closing the space between them, to help unbutton and peel the layers off the mage’s shoulders. It seems like so much more when he’s not trying to tear it all off, enough for him to make an observant grumble. “You wear too much.”

“There’s truth in your words,” Anders answers dryly, shrugging out of the feathered coat he wears, and then reaching for the buckles on Fenris’s cuirass while the elf works on the fastenings of his robe. He brushes a kiss against Fenris’s forehead.

The elf just looks pestered at sweet nothings like forehead pecks, and drops his hands to undo his own belt. “Here I thought I was doing you a favor.” Without the heavy belt and armor, for a moment Fenris looks.. well cleaned up, the clothing left made with a fine quality and generally protected under everything else he wears. Like an elf that might actually belong in Hightown, if his mansion wasn’t so horribly kept. The sight doesn’t last as he’s quick to start undoing each of the multitude of clasps down his front, the lines of lyrium already visible on his freshly bared skin.

Anders’s own things are more utilitarian. His robes have a sturdy sort of fineness to them, but as he shrugs out of them, the tunic underneath is rough and coming apart in places. The trousers aren’t much better off, with threadbare patches along the knees and thighs. “Sorry,” he says, cowed by Fenris’s annoyance. But his gaze wanders over Fenris, and he feels his cheeks growing warm. Of all the things that made him absolutely crazy for the elf, his physical beauty had actually been low on the list… but it’s impossible not to notice at times that he certainly has that in spades. He pauses in his undressing, not sure if he should feel blessed, or ashamed that he has so little to offer in that category, by comparison finding himself so rough, so plain… a genuine oaf beside this princely beauty.

Despite any annoyance the apology throws Fenris and he pauses a split moment. “Why?” While he waits for a reply he reaches his arms back to pull his arms out of the tighter clothing, the rather large deep bruise he knew was probably there suddenly very obvious on his stomach. No matter how bad it looks he seems used to just ignoring it, as he steps forward to find Anders’ lips properly and undo his pants. Regardless of how badly off they are, they hide things a bit better than Fenris’ fitted clothes and the mystery is making him impatient.

Anders leans in and accepts the kiss hungrily. His hands hover at Fenris’s wrists as his pants come unfastened in his hands. There’s still a bit of mystery remaining, his breechcloth holding back a solid hardon, its outline visible through the thin cotton. When the kiss breaks, Anders pulls his tunic off over his head and lets it fall. The various bruises on his body asside, it’s obvious Anders doesn’t live a soft life. He’s solidly built, muscles well defined under a thin, downy fuzz of gingerish hair. Rather than being soft around the middle, the shadows of his ribs are faintly visible. “Explaining it would take too many words,” he says, a tender and slightly sheepish answer.

Fenris props his hands along Anders’ hips to firmly push them back against the nearest counter edge, barely letting that sentence end before he presses their lips back to each other. He’s too distracted to press for an answer, and grinds the mage’s hips with his own contained erection before sliding his hands forward to pull away to last shred of clothing. With little reluctance he breaks the kiss to glance down, and gives a short self conscious chuckle.

Anders puts his arms around Fenris in a loose embrace, his hands cupping the downy hair at the back of the elf’s neck while they kiss. He watches Fenris’s gaze meander downwards, silently praying he likes what he sees. At the sound of that chuckle, he wraps his arms around Fenris’s waist and holds him tightly in place for another slow grind. His head tilts as he seeks Fenris’s mouth with his again.

 

Fenris’ shoulders bunch at the touch, eventually relaxing to a passive tightness but not shoving Anders’ hands away. The reaction is even less noticeable at his hips, and he groans into the kiss as he shoves his hand between them to finally free his cock. He can’t get his tights or underclothes completely off with them like this but he can sure shove them down out of the way, and hooks his hand around both of their shafts as he gives a small thrust forward.

Fenris’s touch elicits a small gasp and a sweet moan. His shaft is thick and hot against Fenris’s, his pulse beating in swollen veins as he grinds back. His tongue dives between Fenris’s lips and thrusts to fill his mouth. His hands cup Fenris’s rear… a rear end he realizes, with a single squeeze, is absolutely perfect… his thumbs massaging the small of Fenris’s back.

Fenris’ chest heaves with shuddering gasps against Anders’ front, arching his back in an attempt to shove them both closer. His free hand ventures up to the mage’s shoulder, and firmly breaks them apart to turn Anders against the counter, his hands dropping to pull their hips back together. The elf’s thick erection grinds along Anders’ ass, Fenris biting the edge of his bottom lip as clear precum beads at the tip and drips onto the paler skin.

Anders grips the edges of the counter, his own shaft sandwiched almost painfully between his belly and the smooth stone. He looks back over his shoulder, dilated eyes dark and veiled by wisps of ash blonde hair. He arches his back, the cleft of his ass offered up as Fenris saws against it with his cock. He can feel that warm, wet trickle and he groans at the thought of Fenris’s intentions. His cock throbs hard, a surge of precum seeping out against his belly.

Fenris lifts his dick away from the mage’s backside, his thumb catching the dribble of precum from his slit and swirling it in a quick circle over the plump head. A couple last jerks along the shaft and he tips his cock lower. He moves his free hand against Anders’ ass to spread it farther and presses the head to kiss the tight ring, pausing a moment there unconsciously. With a steady, determined grind forward he forces it wider as his erection buries itself, and his mouth drops open into an amazed moan.

Anders groans through gritted teeth. His arms lock, bracing him against the counter as his head drops forward, chin to chest, rounding his muscled back. The ring of his anus stretches, flexes against the intrusion and relaxes, Anders’ insides like a rippling vice around Fenris’s cock. His own cock flexes against his abdomen, dripping wet, even the tip swollen hard and darkening like a bruise.

The front of Fenris’ palms grind up from Anders’ ass to find a solid grip on his hipbones, unintentionally smearing a hand across the drop of precum left there, and shoves the mage against the rough movements. The muscles down the elf’s legs shudder taught as he rocks forward, heels lifting from the floor and toes spreading against the cold marble floor for better leverage against the taller man.

Anders’ hips rock back against Fenris’s as they find a rhythm, pushing back harder as he adjusts to the ache of having Fenris sheathed in him. His breathing is ragged, every deep thrust drawing out a moan. His toes curl against stone tiled floor, his knees quaking.

Fenris leans forward against Anders’ back, and presses his parted mouth between the mage’s shoulderblades. His breath is panting and steamy from their efforts as he plants his lips in a loose kiss, and his tongue tests the perspiring skin there that tastes faintly like the clothes that had been on the man so recently. As he feels himself getting closer one of his hands pries itself from Anders’ side, slinks down and grips around his cock, massaging the shaft in time to their fucking.

Anders’ body arches, his head lifting as he moans out loud. Fenris’s hand around his shaft makes him realize just how close he is, each stroke and tug sending raw pleasure cascading through him, gathering tight at the root of his cock, coiling and shuddering each time Fenris’s tip batters him there. A few more strokes and Anders shudders and spasms, crying out loud as he comes. His cock throbs hard with every surge of his cream, and his hips push back against Fenris. his insides rolling and tightening with each spasm of pleasure.

Fenris’ breath grows heavier, and with a sharp choking gasp Anders’ orgasm sends him over the edge. The tightness in his muscles just under his bellybutton builds, for a couple seconds painful, before it releases him to waves of pleasure. Suddenly being on his toes threatens to topple him if he didn’t have support, and his body sends a small shiver down his spine while he milks his cock against the climax he’s buried in. His fingers squeeze Anders’ cock, forcing every last drop onto the counter under them.

“Aahh… hhhnn…” Anders pants for breath, the stimulation from Fenris’s hand becoming almost too much, making him squirm. His knees buckle completely, and he stays upright only by the strength in his shaking arms, braced against the counter. The last drops of his cream pulse out, dripping onto Fenris’s fingers.

Fenris slides up from Anders’ back to stand upright as soon as he has the smallest energy to, chest still rising and falling unsteadily. He sinks back on his heels, spent cock carefully pulling away, and he just stares at the naked man in front of him for a few moments. “That was…” But his words fail him, horribly.

Anders slides to the floor, gasping for breath and gorgeously flushed. He looks up and over his shoulder with the kind of bedroom eyes only the afterglow can bestow, seeing much the same look on the elf’s perfect features. "You… you are…“ Anders is having much the same problem, finally rolling onto his back with a soft moan, letting the stone floor leech some of the feverish heat out of him. "Andraste’s tits, you know how to fuck…”

One corner of Fenris’ lips crook into a breathy, partly embarrassed smile, and he crouches as his energy drains. “I have a feeling you’d be horrified to know where I learned.” He offers an arm out, palm up. “Before your magic comes back, or else I won’t be able to pull you off the floor.” And before the water gets cold, but that’s really a secondary concern as far as the elf cares.

Anders takes Fenris’s arm and stands on shaky legs, a dopey grin spreading over his face. “I would be, but let’s say, I’m glad you’ve been able to put the skill to better use. Maker’s breath…” He makes his unsteady way over to the tub and steps into it, splashing carelessly as he sits down in the warm water. A moment of thought and he holds out his arms, open, inviting Fenris into an embrace. But he looks him in the eyes with an expression that says a refusal is alright. 

Fenris is silent for a couple moments at the offer, very visibly uneasy and half looking like he’s about to find an excuse to leave, so much to glance towards the door. With a heavy sigh his gaze returns to Anders a moment before he looks down to peel his pants and underclothes the rest of the way off. “I suppose we won’t be able to let the Qunari drain you every night…” It’s the best excuse he can give himself but it works, and he carefully steps into the water only an elf would before sinking in. He leans forward, propping his hand against the rim of the tub and gives Anders a small kiss.

Anders slips his arms around Fenris, returning the kiss with a pair of gentle kisses on his eyelids. “You know… when I was a boy, the first time I fled the circle I made a promise to myself I would never wish to be other than what I am. I broke that promise today.” He sits back again, letting Fenris go. His expression is a bit whistful, but not at all unhappy. “Is there anything I can do to make it easier? Maybe… maybe if I wore mittens?”

Are you serious. “I doubt it.” His kisses trail down Anders’ neck, but then he looks up somberly. “I could say the same thing, you know. You’re alright being with an elf?” One that wants to kill mages at every chance he gets, no less.

“I never thought twice about it.” Anders purses his lips, sitting back and sliding down in the tub until the water is up to his collarbone. “In the Circle, elves are equal to humans. I’m used to think of elves as just, peers. I’ve always thought of you as… you, not ‘an elf.’” He pauses, his dopey smile returning. “And it should go without saying that I think you’re the finest thing on two legs, elven or otherwise.”

“I think we’re a bit past flattery, mage.” Fenris glances away, his gaze accidentally landing on the mess of clothes and orgasm they’ve left in their wake before finally landing in the bath. It’s enough to make anyone blush, and his cheeks feel gently hot. With a bit of willed effort he shifts his legs to straddle Anders’ hips, simply a bit more comfortable that way while they’re sitting here. “I assume that means you don’t take issue with these scars either, but at this point I should just question your taste. This could be one of your worse decisions.”

“It’s not flattery!” Anders holds up his palms, then drops them. “Alright, maybe a little. But if I can’t smother you with kisses I have to do -something-.” He looks down at where Fenris rests on his hips and his smile turns from dopey to indulgently pleased. “I could say the same about you, making terrible mistakes and all, but I don’t want to bring your attention to how much of a clod I am. I’d just as soon you not rethink this. But, all of that aside…” His gaze wanders back up,, slowly, self-deprecation fading from his face until there’s just wonder left in his eyes. “I wouldn’t change anything about you. I wouldn’t trade you for anything or anyone. So don’t ever think otherwise. You can think I’m an besotted idiot. That would be true. But to me, you’re… perfect.”

“Mostly I think you’re a besotted idiot for calling me that. If I didn’t know you’re drunk from our sex I’d hate you for it.” With the rest of the night going rather well Fenris gets a bit daring despite himself, his hands dipping into the water after Anders’ and picking his wrists up to rest his palms against the elf’s hips. It’s… a tad uncomfortable, but Fenris decides to deal with it when Anders is already looking the way he is. “You’re as intimidating as the rest. I used to watch you when I could…” Well, before Hawke wisely decided it best to not bring them to the same places together. He clears his throat. “What I meant is… I’m not going to change, neither are you. We don’t agree about anything. I’m going to hurt you with my choices, someday.”

Anders gently kneads and massages Fenris’s hips, savoring the touch for all its worth. At Fenris’s words, his expression sobers, and he gives him a pleading look. “Why not? Why not change? I’ve changed before. Being with you… has always made me think I could change again.” He smiles wryly. “Ah, there I go, disagreeing with you again. Maybe it is a bad decision, but it’s made and I’m not unmaking it. It’s not my first and it probably won’t be my last.”

“I’ll hold you to it then.” Fenris leans into another deeper kiss, his lips parting even though he feels a bit like he’s getting enough for the year in during this night alone. Making up for the time they threw away, maybe. He pulls back from the kiss to look a bit more pointedly, honestly debating on picking up their clothes and leaving the rest. He’d be content with 'dried sex from fucking a mage’ added to the list of atrocities he’s done to this place. “I suppose at this point I should offer you my bed, unless you want to limp home.” Of course, this isn’t really a choice.

Anders kisses back, still feeling that elated rush at their closeness. “Your generosity knows no bounds,” he says, with a bit of a sensual purr in his voice. He runs the balls of his thumbs down Fenris’s hipbones to the tender skin at the hinge of his thighs. “But first, have you got any soap around here?”

“You really test your luck with everything, don’t you?” Even still he raises a hand to point to a nook in the stone wall behind Anders’ shoulder, where a thin stone box holds the soap. He wouldn’t have known it himself if he hadn’t been around extravagant mansions previously. “The rich are absurd.”


	7. Chapter 7

Anders is usually an early riser, but given that sun is streaming through the windows of the bedroom by the time he wakes up, he considers himself to have slept in. He sits up slowly, stiff, sore, and aching in a number of places, but he can feel his magic again, and the presence of Justice in his mind.   
He looks over to see Fenris asleep and for a moment just gazes at him. It still feels strange to have a chance to look at his unguarded face. The degree to which it’s difficult to trust isn’t lost on Anders, and he makes, for the umpteenth time, another sober vow that he won’t give Fenris a reason to regret that choice. And he smiles for a moment at the roiling mix of feelings Fenris stirs in him, the only thing in common the intensity, the ache of them all, the way they’ll never be still. The yearning to make Fenris actually hear the words he silently mouths now: "I love you.“  
But it isn’t all bad. And he feels a bit smug as he thinks back on how they ended the night before. Standing up, stretching gingerly, he begins to call his magic to his hands, soothing away the leftover hurts and bruises on his body.

Fenris is quite the opposite, finding no need in the morning hours when he’s not often being forced awake anymore, and he mixes in with the shadows of Hightown better than the finery strutting about during the day. Besides, his… friends seems like a strong word for most of them, but in any case they tend to prefer the darker hours too.  
And for some reason people tend to frown on those that drink in the morning, so it can sod off.  
But something he is most definitely not used to, is someone else stirring in his bed. The few times had with other people never meant anything and they’d separate soon after. Even though his body is still, crashed out on his stomach with his arm around a pillow propped under his cheek, his mind wakes in a small panic. After a tense second he remembers the night before and grogily turns, cracking an eye open towards Anders and already with his mood about him, before he stretches his arms out under his chest to sit up, catlike. He pauses as he realizes what Anders is doing, then turns so he can sit up properly with his knees drawing up and palms propped behind him. "Do you always take shortcuts for everything?” Even this early and he has that tone again.

Anders turns, eyes narrowing in a bit of a nonplussed look. "Oh, did you fancy that black eye?“ He reaches for a heavy candlestick resting on the dusty mantel nearby and holds it up as if ready to bludgeon himself. "I can fix that for you in a hurry. How about a split lip to go with it, really complete the look?”

Fenris seethes as he glares back, all the darker from Anders’ response. “/Go ahead/. You can always just fix anything inconvenient instead of dealing with the consequences.”

Anders tilts his head. Putting the candlestick down again, he goes with the impulse to say the most annoying thing he can think of. "Jealous much?“

"Hardly, mage. You can treat everything like a game even if others suffer in your wake. I can’t imagine how superficial everyone must seem to you.”

“Oh yes. That’s exactly why I work myself to exhaustion healing refugees for no pay. I just like to revel in my own superiority so much I don’t know when to stop.” Anders steps over to the bed and leans down, placing his face within inches of Fenris. "You know, this argument wouldn’t feel so pointless if I thought you even believed what you’re saying. You’re just angry. And not at me.“ Anders closes that last few inches, tilting his head and pressing his warm lips to Fenris’s mouth.

The elf’s usual pent up anger burns hot enough that he practically flares blue, but it’s silenced in the same moment to no more than a small flash. Fenris sighs in defeat through his nose, closing his eyes for the few moments that he tilts his chin to return the kiss. When they gently part his head falls to look away, diffused almost too far. "I wish I wasn’t like this.”

Anders rests his forehead against Fenris’s for a moment before he straightens up again. He sits down on the edge of the bed, sympathy in his eyes. "You’ve a reason to be,“ he says after a pause. "And I know how it feels… to carry that around inside.”

“Do you?” It sounds a bit doubtful but an honest question nonetheless. Fenris’ words that follow are purposeful, and halting as it takes will to say them. “Even though I’ve left Danarius, he made sure I wouldn’t forget that he could get anything he wanted. Every time I see my skin I’m reminded of what he did. It boils something dark inside me, and he put it there.” He goes silent, then adds quietly as he realizes, “My freedom is a joke, I would never be free unless I died.”

Anders lowers his head, swallowing a tight knot in his throat. "Maybe I don’t. It was never so personal, anything that was done to me.“ He shakes his head slowly, hands balling into fists. "You know I will never, ever let him near you again? Not him, not anybody he sends to do his dirty work. Maker willing you’ll have long years of peace to bury the past, and every night you spend, free, among friends, without a thought of that … fucking -monster- in your head, you’ll prove you won your freedom after all, and he was always wrong.”

Fenris’ eyes flick to Anders’ anger piling into his hands and trails up to his face, obscured as it is by his hair. “You sound stronger than I am about it.” He pauses again. “I thought he’d sent you, that time. And I was so easily convinced that it was over again.”

Anders raises his head somewhat, remembering, looking bemused for a moment before a slanted smile tugs at his lips. "You’ve obviously never heard me speak Arcanum. 'Tir-ev-e ei-l-ud digit-ud.’“ While he’s obviously playing it up a bit, Anders’ accent is absolutely, comically terrible. He reads the language fine of course, and understands it if spoke slowly, but he’s learned it entirely out of books and it shows.

Fenris jerks slightly at that, as mangled as it is he hasn’t heard anyone but himself say a word of that language since he escaped. He just stares blankly at Anders a moment before his brain pieces together the meaning through the jumbling. A small smile cracks on the edges of his lips. "That was horrible. Do you even know what you said?”

Anders grins and holds out his index finger. "There aren’t a lot of ways a twelve year old in the Circle can have fun. Translating dirty jokes into Arcanum could usually be passed off as actual studying.“

Fenris just sighs quietly and shakes his head with a tiny hiss through his teeth as he curses. "Pedicare. And I was actually scared of you at one point. Did you learn anything more useful than that?”

“In the Circle? Oh, lots of things. I’m hoping to try a little of it out on you sometime.” From the look on Anders’ face he isn’t referring to language -or- magic. "But as for Arcanum, I can read it easily, write it with a bit of effort, and … you’ve heard how well I speak it. I understand it spoken enough that I can pick up every third word or so, when you mutter in it.“

 

"You listened to me that closely?” He honestly hadn’t imagined anyone paying attention, much less anyone caring enough to try to understand. Fenris quickly jots back through his memories for what he’s said over the past few years. “I… probably said some things..” And he trails off, wondering if Anders even caught them. He’s said quite a few colorful things about the man in the past.

Anders shrugs. “Nothing worse than you were willing to say to my face, though that ‘filius mulieris meretricis’ bit was a bit hurtful. My mother was a lovely woman.” Anders’ reproach is fairly mild. “I should thank you for filling in some of the gaps in my vocabulary, now that you mention it…” Mischief glints in Anders’ eyes and he slides off the bed, kneeling down at Fenris’s feet. He looks up into his eyes and drags his tongue across his lips. “So do you still want me to 'fellatio deid caudud’?”

Fenris’ cheeks go hot at that, and he tries to look away but can’t. “I never would’ve said those things if I knew you’d understand. I can’t say no.” Emphasizing his confession rather nicely is the bulge growing under the thin black fabric of the small bit of clothing he somehow managed to slide back into before they fell asleep.

“You’re forgiven,” Anders says. He shifts closer, nudging Fenris’s knees appart if he’ll allow it. “And if I’d thought you were being more literal at the time this would’ve happened long, long before now.”

Fenris gulps softly as he lets his legs comfortably draw open, clothing doing absolutely nothing but stretch over the clear profile of his erection. It’s comical how on edge he suddenly feels over sex when he’s had no problems until now. Nobody else mattered. “We’re both idiots, then. Half of me did.”

While Anders apparently can offer to suck dick without batting an eyelash, -that- makes him blush. His flushed lips kiss Fenris’s thick shaft through the fabric of his breechcloth before he peels it away. “That’s good to know,” he says, his voice a soft and earnest murmur. He cups Fenris’s cock and balls as he lifts them free of his underwear, all of his attention absorbed now in the act. Last night, he hadn’t had much chance to just admire Fenris’s hard-on, and now he seems committed to learning every fold of skin, every throbbing vein. He kisses the base of Fenris’s shaft, lips touching, tugging the loose skin along its underside as he makes his way slowly but diligently to the plump tip of his cock.

Fenris sucks in a quiet gasp of air, the muscles of his stomach already tightening from the pleasure and simple view of it. His hips shift to give Anders better access to every inch of his cock. It’s already rock hard from his first few touches, skin warm and velvety smooth save a few well defined veins under the mage’s lips.  
It takes him a moment to realize he’s never actually had a blowjob before that he can remember. Too late to back off now.

Anders’ breath is a warm tickle over Fenris’s skin, a muted moan of lust in his throat the instant before he sucks Fenris’s tip into his mouth. His tongue gives a lighter touch than any hand could as it traces slow circles over the tip, and then rubs up against the tender underbelly of Fenris’s shaft as Anders takes in more and more of his length. His eyes are veiled, then closed as he gives into the sensuality of it, indulging in the feel of that smooth, thick shaft filling his mouth, nudging at the back of his throat. His own cock is hard in sympathy, standing out from between his legs.

Fenris lets a slow groan escape his lips, air already hot from his rising lust. He lightly rests a hand along Anders’ head, fingers slowly weaving through his hair. His eyes flutter shut hazily as he focuses specifically on the man’s tongue gliding along his erection, his other hand digging against a bedsheet nearby, and as the tip of his cock grazes along the back of Anders’ throat he can feel precum as it wells up to drip amidst the heat.

Anders’ head bobs slowly along Fenris’s shaft, his lips tugging back and then his mouth plunging down again while his tongue works, his cheeks hollow from sucking. A flick of the tip of his tongue across Fenris’s slit and he can taste the mild salt and bitterness of his precum. He wraps one hand around the base of Fenris’s shaft to coax and knead, trying to milk him for more warm, thick droplets. 

Fenris’ eyes open to watch Anders intently, lips going dry as he pants softly through them. His hand drops from stroking through the blonde hair in the tiniest spark of panic about a hand touching him so firmly, but he only gets as far as loosely resting his palm against Anders’ wrist before he’s won over by the precum being coaxed out of his throbbing shaft. Before long he feels a familiar faint tingling spread along his flexing muscles, and he tries to get his words past a long moan. “Anders, I’m going to…”

Anders’ eyes flicker open, looking up into Fenris’s face while he sucks, his tongue working against Fenris even harder than before. He watches his pleasure crest and peak, sucks and swallows Fenris’s come with a small, indulgent moan, his lips, his mouth, his hand all milking Fenris for all he can give.

Fenris’ cock spasms in Anders’ mouth as it pumps thick threads of the elf’s climax over his tongue. His body is racked with a shiver as his hips twitch forward with each wave of pleasure, dragged out as the mage milks him completely. Even as it begins to subside he slowly grinds his cock forward until the last drops are sucked from his pulsing slit.  
As soon as he can bear to he leans forward and hooks and arm under the mages’, and firmly hauls him up into a tired but hungry kiss.

Anders leans over Fenris as they kiss and kiss deeply. The taste of Fenris’s pleasure is still in his mouth, on his tongue, and Anders is all the more passionate for it. When the kiss breaks he trails more kisses along Fenris’s jaw, making his warm and lazy way down to his collarbone, then back up to the bottom rim of his ear. “And here we were on the verge of getting out of bed,” he murmurs in that pointy ear. “Let me make up for my unfair advantages. You rest, and I’ll bring you back some breakfast from the market.” He’ll need a very cold dip in the bath beforehand.

Fenris tips his chin out of the way, having small trouble calming his lungs with the mage at his neck. If he had any say at all they’d just be at this sort of thing all morning. “Wait-” He catches Anders’ shoulder and turns his head to lock them into another kiss, already a bit addicted to the taste of it, and when he pulls away he looks a bit confused. “Are you always so…” Words just escape him again. He wants to say obsessive, but that has too many negative connotations, that the attention isn’t welcome. “…enthusiastic?” Having breakfast was another Tevinter luxury he’d just let fall by the wayside.

“Yes,” Anders answers softly when the kiss breaks. "Or maybe I should say, I haven’t been in a long while, and it feels good to know I didn’t lose this part of myself completely. Is this… alright?“ Rather than getting up again, he takes advantage of the excuse to lay down against Fenris’s side, head on his shoulder.

 

Fenris cants his chin upward, even as his gaze settles on Anders from the corner of his eyes. "It’s fine. I’m not used to someone doing things for me.. but I don’t mind it.” He tips his head back down to very lightly rest it against Anders, barely touching much less putting weight into the action. “Why do you care?” It’s said with so much plain curiosity, as if the other man had just said he prefers red cards to blue ones.

 

Anders shrugs, just a gentle movement of his body against Fenris. "I don’t want to scare you off, though I suppose bringing home breakfast is not very high on the list of frightening things about me. The … impulse behind it is to show I care. So if it made you uncomfortable I’d stop, and try to find something else I could do that would make you happy.“

A small frustrated sigh brushes over Anders’ hair. "That doesn’t explain anything.” Really the frustration is aimed at himself more than anything, for all that they’ve fought this isn’t exactly the outcome he imagined. And moreso, what Anders blurted out all that time ago. “You said.. that you loved me.”

“I’m sorry… I don’t think I understand what you’re asking.” Anders lifts himself up on one elbow so he can look Fenris in the eyes. "I’ll say it again, too. I love you, Fenris.“

"Yes, that.” That right there, and just like the last time he’s a bit surprised at the certainty of it. “How do you know so easily?”

“Shouldn’t I? All the times I’ve lost sleep thinking about you. The way it drove me out of my head that you’d been hurt and I wanted to soothe away the pain and help you heal. The way I could never reduce you in my mind to some anti-mage bigot because you were clearly so much more than your anger. At first I longed for your validation… but after not very long, it was just you. I wanted to do what I could… what little I could… and I didn’t even care if you noticed or if you changed your mind about me. Or, well, I did care… but it wouldn’t change my feelings about you, is what I mean. I knew I was going to want you, whether I wanted to or not.”

“Hm. I guess it was easy for you then.” Fenris can easily see how a dedication could build like that. But he’s not a healer, and the mage had seemed to do fine without his worry since Justice was there. He looks down, in thought. “I.. feel as if I don’t really know what love is. I certainly thought about you, though mostly when I wanted to hate someone for what was done to me. You seemed to take it well.” He couldn’t let off steam at Bethany after all, she’d crumple.

“I’m used to it. I’ve been the whipping boy before. I… can’t say it never hurt, though.” With a heavy sigh at a long, long list of memories, Anders settles back against Fenris’s side again, his ear to his chest to listen to the sound of his breathing and the instrumental thrum of his voice resonating there. "As for love… it doesn’t bother me if you take your time. It took me a while but I learned that with you, I can’t really expect things to happen on my terms. And that’s alright.“

"I owe you an apology. For everything, I’m a fool and you deserve someone else.” Someone who isn’t quite so obviously broken. “…and I can’t even say that I won’t do it again.” He tries to silently console himself on that point, that at least Anders has a good tactic to stop it. It wouldn’t have mattered what he had been arguing about, that kiss this morning had drained all the anger so well.

“I don’t want anybody else, I want you. I forgive you, and I know it will happen again, and I know I’ll forgive you again.” Anders closes his eyes, curling up against Fenris. "Besides. I don’t think it would work with anyone who didn’t drive me completely to distraction the way you do. Justice …drowns out a lot. It takes something intense, to be heard and felt over him. I like having something else to think about.“ Anders trails off, and lifts his chin again. "That you would apologize means the world to me, though. Thank you.”

Fenris remains silent a moment, very achingly aware of Justice’s general presence at all times, and the mention of his name makes the elf think carefully on anything he says. Any of the million and one criticisms against a demon claiming to be good. “Will I ever understand why you did this to yourself? Would you again, if you knew?” For a moment he wonders if the second question would stir hostility between the two, but they’re probably past that at this point.

“If I knew, no, I wouldn’t. It was a terrible mistake and I’m going to have to find a way to live with it.” And Justice, for his part, had had no more idea of what would happen than Anders had. "Neither of us knew what would happen. And as for ‘why’, it’s a long story.“

"Then I’m sorry.” Another apology already, though this one is more casual and born of sympathy. Fenris resettles to lean back against Anders and loosely drapes an arm over his shoulders. “At least your regrets hide well.” Finally, curiosity gets the better of him. “What does he think of this?”

“Approximately as I do. We share one mind and we have the same thoughts, for the most part. It’s hard to explain. It took me weeks to reorient myself when it happened. I will say… he’s homesick. He belongs in the Fade but he can’t get back. And also, he likes you. He likes people who have the courage of their convictions, but … he sees you through my eyes, and I see a lot to admire, is one way to put it. We share one heart, too, and the strongest thing in it used to be anger. And now… it’s tempered with something else. It changes us.” Anders pauses, smiling a bit whistfully. "For the better, I think. Justice’s purity was natural in the Fade… but in this world, everything is different. We need balance here, not purity.“

Fenris smirks a little, a bit overwhelmed. "It’s strange, saying you’re one but speaking seperately. Much less that I have to impress a demon as well as you. And here I thought Isabela was joking..” But that aside, because actively pursuing anything romantically with Justice makes him feel awkward. “I can’t pretend to understand. Not really. But I want to.”

“Someday I might figure out a way to explain it. Or better yet, someday it won’t even be relevant anymore.” Anders shifts just a bit, to return his attention to the fact Fenris has an arm around him and it is really, sublimely comfortable. “Maybe it’s a bit like… if you speak out of anger, it’s different from when you’re speaking out of a place of sympathy. It comes out of your mouth, and out of the same mind, but in my case, those two emotional 'places’ have different names and different backgrounds.”

Fenris shakes his head faintly. “I’ll just have to figure it out while I’m with you.” Sounds like a good proposition as any. He gives his hug a small squeeze. “It sounds like a small blessing that you’re… 'attached’. I can’t imagine what our fights would be in your head. They’d take you away.”

Anders’ eyes turn upwards from where he rests his head against Fenris. “You know, you’re really incredibly sweet?”

 

Fenris gives a small huff of a silent chuckle. “I certainly wouldn’t go that far. What were you expecting? Something evil?” Though honestly he can’t imagine being any moreso than he is.

“Possibly someone who would not be so indulgent of my cuddly, sappy nature? I’m glad I was wrong!” Anders grins, snuggling like an affectionate kitten and rubbing his head against Fenris’s chest and shoulder. “And on that topic, there are some things I want to ask you.”

Fenris shrugs, careful to keep from disturbing Anders too much. “It’s not hard to tolerate it.” Well. He enjoys the affection, but hell if he’ll admit it. “What is it?”

“I know that it’s hard for you to be touched. And I’ve been guessing it has to do with your marks. I want to know if there’s anything I can do… and.. it doesn’t -hurt- does it? When I touch you?”

“I… it’s not the scars specifically, than the memory of it.” He shifts, the words alone invoking things unpleasant. “Only the hands of mages. I could say it hurts, and it does, but that wouldn’t be quite accurate. The anticipation hurts.” 

It’s somewhat familiar in the way that Anders tenses every time he sees a templar breastplate, expecting a punch in the gut. Expecting to be suddenly helpless as he gets the shit beaten out of him “for the good of all mankind.” He shuts his eyes and he swallows, realizing that every time he reaches out, Fenris is trying not to flinch away when everything in him expects to be burned. “Maker… I’m so sorry.”

Fenris looks down. “Don’t. We’ll.. think of something.” He has no idea what, but something. Something other than mittens. “I’ve killed enough mages for touching me. It’s time I learn to suffer it better.”

“Perhaps I’m ambitious but I’d like you not to suffer at all, when I make love to you. In the meantime… I’m not going to say no if you need to tie my hands from time to time.”

“I’d thought of that.” Maybe not what he had intended to admit, but there it is. Fenris reaches his free hand down to catch one of Anders’ wrists. He lifts it, palm up, and gives it a small kiss. “It’s less if I’m the one touching you.”

Anders’ heart gives a little flutter at that, derailing his erstwhile thoughts of the wicked elf Fenris and his plot to have mages bound and writhing nakedly at his absolute mercy. A plot that a lot of mages, if told about it, would probably hop right on board with, from Anders’ memories of the Fereldan circle. “I very /very/ much enjoy you touching me… if that wasn’t obvious.” His cheeks turn faintly pink.

Fenris’ fingers draw up the back of Anders’ hand, knit between his knuckles and pull back to keep the mage’s palm comfortably exposed as he murmurs against it. “I gathered as much, after last night.” He must take some sort of amusement out of making Anders blush, as he places more kisses along his palm, lips loose and teasingly sensual as they trail down to the softer skin at the mage’s wrist.

Anders watches, captivated. His heart pounds, and it quickly becomes obvious where it’s pumping his blood to in such a damned hurry. His joints feel like water, while other places feel tense and tight, and he can’t take his eyes off Fenris’s mouth, a mouth that was obnoxiously beautiful even when it scowled. And his eyes, when they have that look in them… Anders doesn’t merely blush, he moans.

Here they’d been intending to get up at all. Breakfast, falling by the wayside and completely forgotten. Fenris sucks at the skin under his touch as he travels back up, kisses moister this time. His lips come to a stop at the last joint along Anders’ thumb, and they part enough to swirl his tongue over that skin just below the pad. 

Anders lets out a shaky sigh, distinctly back to the state he was in when he’d offered to bring back breakfast – if he goes now he’ll need that cold, cold bath beforehand. His lips begin to feel dry, so he wets them with the tip of his tongue. “You are so incredibly beautiful,” he whispers hoarsely.

Fenris’ gaze looks up to meet Anders’, mouth still loosely pursed along the mage’s thumb. He fully realizes he got a bit carried away just a tad too late. His mouth rises from Anders’ hand to find his neck, and with no more reason to hold him in place the elf’s fingers drop to draw a tight O around Anders’ cock. “Well at least we’re in agreement about each other.”

Anders’ head drops back. He bites down on his lower lip, almost stifling another moan. In the back of his mind he realizes what Fenris just said, and his rational mind quietly blows a fuse. His arms wrap around Fenris, heedless of the fears that usually hold him back. He rolls them both over, holding himself propped on his elbows over Fenris as he attempts to maul the elf with kisses.

Fenris’ guard had been down too much for him to protest the hug, and a bit of air puffs from his lungs as his back hits the bed. As his own erection starts to harden between them his hand tightens around Anders’, and jerks across the shaft with his palm grinding along the softer underside. His kisses grow hungrier, sucking at the mage’s neck as he groans softly.

Anders’s cock drips warm precum into Fenris’s palm. He places one knee between Fenris’s leg and grinds down, his hipbone offered for Fenris to press his growing hard on up against. Anders finally remembers the bit about breakfast and his other ulterior motive of trying to get a bottle of good oil for them to use. He’s going to have to make do with what he has. Lifting his head for a moment, he slips two fingers into his mouth and draws them out dripping with saliva. He reaches down then, around and under Fenris’s hip, cool wet touch seeking the tight pucker of his ass.

Fenris gasps under Anders’ touch, not entirely in a good way as the muscles along his back tighten. With a very forced will he spreads his legs farther, and grinds his hips upward in an attempt to distract his nerves. It’s only partly successful but his breathing still hitches from their lust, not quite so easily deterred by pain. His hand slides up along Anders’ shaft and places a thumb over the slit, touch a bit slow and exploring as he massages the precum there over the head.

Anders nuzzles in against Fenris’s ear, breathing softly across it, moaning as his thumb rubs over the tip of his solid hard on. “Do you want me to fuck you?” He whispers, voice hoarse but gentle, his fingers stroking light, moist spirals over the entrance to Fenris’s ass.

Fenris leans his cheek back against the nuzzling, even as his anus flexes from the touch it’s unused to, and he rumbles a response,“I don’t think I need to state the obvious.” To emphasize his point his hand slides down to the base of Anders’ cock, and gives it a small pull forward.

Anders gasps sharply at that tug and grazes at Fenris’s shoulder with his teeth. A shock goes through him when his tongue draws across one of the Lyrium lines on Fenris’s skin, a feeling of aching cold, but rendered strangely, intensely pleasant. He reaches down with one hand as he re-settles his weight and fits the thick, dripping tip of his cock to Fenris’s anus. Before he presses in, he kisses that pale line again, touching lightly with the tip of his tongue and feeling that -shiver- again, sustaining it longer. But this time, he gathers his magic and he pushes back, as softly as he can. Pushes that shivering, shimmering pleasure back into the webwork of Lyrium lines, letting it seep through them all, a pulse of the sweetest sensations he can think of, a loving touch that reaches deeper than Fenris’s skin.

Fenris shifts restlessly against the plump cock leaning against him, and firmly squeezes his thighs against Anders’ sides as he decidedly likes the feeling of the mage between them. He barely notices the first lick from Anders amongst the rest but he reacts instantly to the second one, writhing in place under the mage’s body with a small shudder. “What did you do?” One of his hands catch against Anders’ hip, his soft moan half pleading as the small wave of pleasure radiates from his shoulder.

“Touched you… the Lyrium in your skin. It… sings to me,” he whispers. “So I sang back.” He begins to press into Fenris, groaning sharply, almost startled, when the head of his cock makes that definitive pop past the tight ring of Fenris’s anus. He feels hot, tight, and indescribably good. It takes effort and a very hard bite of the lip to keep control, to work his way deeper slowly and give Fenris time to adjust. He puts his lips against the lines on Fenris’s chin and ‘breathes’ another note of delight into his marks.

Fenris honestly isn’t sure what to feel about magic soaking into him, but he’s too distracted by his senses to care. Instead of responding properly he cries out a surprised moan as Anders sinks in, his erection twitching against his stomach as it dribbles a glistening puddle of precum on his skin. He rocks his hips down, angling them as he tries to bury the mage deeper and grind the head of Anders’ cock against that freshly discovered spot that’s already threatening to drive him nuts.

Anders is all too happy to oblige, mildly surprised and intensely grateful that Fenris gets so much more pleasure than pain from having his cock buried in him. His hips thrust forward, then gyrate slowly, stirring Fenris’s insides with his shaft. He can feel that firm spot up against his tip and he grinds against it, adjusting the angle of his hips so each sharp thrust batters at it. He covers Fenris’s panting mouth with his own, thrusting in his tongue in time with the motions of his hips.

It does hurt, no escaping that simple fact with his first time with nothing else to aid them, and Fenris silently snarls into the kiss as he bears it. Even in Tevinter he’d avoid mages patch him up beyond the barest minimum for survival, and this is… well, it’s sharp, but not like getting stabbed through, and he wants it. He groans loudly, the sound still muffled between them, and he drops back from their kiss to suck in a gasp of air, eyes half-lidded as he focuses on the pleasure that’s making his cock throb.

Anders presses his mouth to Fenris’s neck as his head drops back. kissing and sucking, biting lightly at his skin, sucking fleeting little tastes of lyrium from his marks. His hips rock against Fenris, falling into a steady rhythm. Heat flushes through Anders’ body, painting his face, his chest with a rosy blush, darkening his hair with fresh sweat. Fenris is so tight it feels almost like he could wring the life out of his cock, but that only makes him swell thicker inside his body, warm, steady trickles of precum making his thrusts gradually smoother, easier.

Fenris bites the edge of his bottom lip but immediately after drops his jaw open, his breathing too heavy and unpredictable to keep his mouth closed, the bitten flesh pinker from it and glossed with saliva. The pain seems to give way as he feels his cock tighten with it’s need, and against any judgement his muscles tighten like a vice around Anders’ shaft, amplifying every detail of the mage’s erection and it’s movements inside him. He doesn’t even have time to gasp out a name, as his abs flex without warning and his cock spills cum across his burning hot stomach and chest.

“Fenris!” Anders’ eyes roll shut as he bucks his hips, buried to the hilt in Fenris’s climaxing body. His balls draw up tight against his shaft, aching with need and finally able to give. His cock throbs hard inside Fenris with every spasm of climax, every gush of cream that it pumps into him in a rush of warmth, and Anders moaning sweetly in Fenris’s ear while he shudders. The pleasure that wracks him is so intense that as it ebs, he feels dizzy, inwardly scoured and purged, utterly spent. his body resting on the elf’s as he pants for breath and groans with the aftershocks.

Fenris’ chest heaves for air under the mage, and lets his eyes flutter shut, cock left twitching with his draining orgasm between their bodies. He leans his head to turn against Anders, a very subtle nuzzle, and he blindly kisses the mage’s jaw as exhaustion sinks into them like a heavy fog. “I need a drink next time.” 

Anders carefully pulls himself free, rolling to Fenris’s side and laying with an arm draped over him. “We’ll use some oil next time. It’s been ages since I’ve had a reason to keep any around.” He gives Fenris’s shoulder a bristly nuzzle, letting his eyes drift shut in a moment of utter contentment.

Now that their sex haze has passed Fenris becomes increasingly aware of the dull ache emanating from his hips. He’d be perfectly happy going back to sleep on the spot, if it weren’t for that nagging bundle of nerves. “You couldn’t have thought of that before we started this?”

“I didn’t think either of us could stand the notion of postponing… things.” Anders blushes anew, but this time from shame, He lifts his head, his expression fretful. “I hope I didn’t hurt you.”

Fenris cracks his eyes open, body reluctant but a small part of him just wants to see the mage worried. Lazily the elf raises an eyebrow, slightly baffled at the question. He can’t imagine that not hurting. “It did, but I’m fine.”

Anders sits up, running his fingers through tangled hair and propping his elbows against his knees. He notices that the pools of light on the floor have traveled quite a way since he woke up. “I’ll get you a drink,” he says, apologetic, setting his bare feet on the floor.

Fenris pushes his elbows under him, without energy to make any ambitious commitments such as sitting up. He sighs, had been half expecting that reaction, and as his chin is propped forward along his chest he glances across the mess on his front, then looks up. “/Anders/. A towel.” Sod the drink.

Anders turns, about to give a quick and meek ‘yes’ when he gets a good look at Fenris, splattered rather appealingly with his own orgasm. His cock gives a twinge to let him know that he’s definitely too spent right now to fully appreciate the sight. Still, his eyebrows lift appreciatively, and something else dawns on him. “You said my name,” he lilts, beginning to grin. He grabs a towel from the back of a chair and tosses it to Fenris. “That’s… twice now. In one day.” His grin begins to turn distinctly cocky. Even so, he picks up an open bottle from the small reading table by the fireplace and brings it over to Fenris, after taking a quick sip himself. 

The elf manages to catch the towel despite himself, seemingly immune to how he looks at the moment, and as he sits up a bit more to wipe himself clean he levels an unimpressed gaze onto Anders. “Your point?” He reaches for the bottle and tips it back for a heavy swig, gulping the wine down as the neck of the bottle parts from his lips. It burns down his throat and the warmth of the alcohol starts to radiate outward in a way that he’s grateful for, even if he’d turned it down moments ago.

“I just appreciate it, that’s all.” It does, however, make Anders feel a bit warm and fuzzy inside. He contemplates accusing Fenris of liking him a bit, but then realizes that the several hours of sex and cuddling they just enjoyed should have been enough to tip him off. And hence, his smug grin turns a bit sheepish at the realization that he’s being an idiot, again. “It sounds classy when you say it.” Anders begins looking around and gathering up his clothes, pulling his breeches on.

“I’ll take that as a compliment.” With that and a small stretch Fenris sets the bottle down on the bedside table and stands, casting a glance towards the window as he starts to pick through his clothes. Around midday, when he usually wakes up anyway. It makes him smirk softly as he slips on his underclothes and tights, hooking each leg to the arch of his foot. “I fear I’ve ruined your plan to get breakfast.” Not that he wouldn’t have done the exact same thing over again, given the chance.

“Change of plans. Lunch.” Anders pulls his trousers on, and then slips his tunic over his head. “We should head to the Hanged Man. Make sure the others are doing alright since the fight. I’m buying – Only fair, seeing as you saved me from a fate worse than death and are also incredibly good looking.” Anders adds that last bit after a moment of staring enrapt at Fenris, and the way the afternoon sunlight hits his skin.

Fenris is momentarily halted as he closes every button along his top, and absently conceals that he’s flustered with his tone. “If I don’t stop you, maybe you’ll eventually you’ll get tired of saying that.” Who’s paying doesn’t bother him enough to voice a complaint over it even if he would’ve thought it the other way around, assuming that they’ll be floating tabs between them for a while to come. But it’s the idea of seeing the others, when it mulls around in his brain, that gives him pause. “I’m sure they’re fine, nobody came here to ask where you were.” Seems logical enough an assessment. Don’t need healing, don’t track down the mage.

“I believe you’re right,” Anders says, shrugging into his robe, with plenty of buttons and buckles of his own to fasten. “But I want to see them and get the news. And give them my thanks, as well.” Anders looks quite serious as he thinks back to the night before. “Damn, that whole battle and I was captive and useless. I owe Hawke an apology.”

Fenris finally stretches the straps of his light armor over his chest and arms, never comfortable setting foot out of the mansion without it when he only keeps imagining a slaver ambush from some alley. As he settles everything into place he says dryly, “With any luck we won’t run into anyone else.” But then after a moment of reality sinking in, he adds, “Unless it’s Isabela. She knows already, if only because she made it up first.”

On this particular topic, Anders seems ignorant. “Knows? Knows what?” Anders begins tying his hair up in the usual manner, missing a few wisps that hang over his brow. “You mean… this? Us? You and me and the… Andraste, what is there to know?” Anders looks perplexed.

 

Fenris sighs heavily at the fact that Anders doesn’t seem to be dreading this like he is. “We know the same people. They’re going to gossip the moment one hears we’re no longer at each others’ throats.”

“But… why? I thought they’d be happy. I know everyone was sick of listening to us bicker.” Anders scratches the back of his head and takes his staff from where it’s propped up against the wall. “We could avoid the place if you’d rather. There’s always the… the…. and then there’s… Alright, I don’t know any other taverns.”

Fenris shakes his head. “There’s a place by the docks, but it constantly smells of fish.” He scrunches his nose a bit on the last word the same way he’s always looked a bit disgustedly ill at blood mages. He shakes his head as that makes the answer for him. “Let’s just go and get it over with, it’s inevitable anyway.”

“I can pretend to fight with you, if you want?” Anders is a bit at a loss, and he admits to himself that if it were up to him, he’d probably be shouting from the rooftops that he was in love and thoroughly laid. He’d be a bit bothered, if it weren’t that this seemed to fit more with Fenris’s normal level of misanthropy, rather than some indication that Fenris was ashamed to be seen with him. “As long as I still get an ale and Nug hoagie I’m fine.”

Fenris shrugs, already halfway out of the room to lead the way. “Just be ready to hold me back if Isabela cracks too many jokes.” Though honestly her jokes are something he’d likely be able to tolerate, it’s everyone else he’s worried about.

 

The pub is busy enough at this hour, people milling about between tables and stopping by the bar to order more grub, while the staff zips about to fill requests as they can. The only difference between lunch and the night hours are the amount of drunks, with no windows to tell what hour it is. The doorway flashes the outside sun as people come in, and instead of his usual pause there to survey the crowd Fenris opts to usher them both in without looking, hoping the amount of people hides them well enough as they pick out an empty table to one corner.

Anders does take time to look around. He doesn’t try to grab anyone’s attention as he follows Fenris to their table, but he does see Isabela in her usual spot at the bar. He doesn’t spot Varric, but the Dwarf is still very likely somewhere on the premises. He leans his staff against the wall and slouches casually in the booth Fenris picks, then scans the crowd again, reflexively checking for Templar breastplates.

Fenris settles into his spot at Anders’ side, only now taking the moment to really look everyone over. Well, at least it’s definitively not a question of whether he’s ashamed to be with the mage or not. A waitress passes by and almost absently drops a mug in front of both of them as she passes, at the very least recognizing Fenris for his all too many hours here. The elf picks up his mug, but on a sudden thought props his elbow to the table as he leans in to cut through the general noise. “Do you see Hawke?”  
Of course, this is precisely when Isabela turns and spots them, and immediately picks up her drink without hesitation to beeline for their table. Fenris freezes a moment, then just chugs a bit from his mug of ale. This entire day has been ‘not drunk enough’, and he intends to change that.  
Isabela gets a broad, catlike and excited smile as she sets down her drink opposite them, and props her palms against the table with a mock gasp. “You didn’t!”

“We didn’t what?” Anders’ preternatural ability to home in on the most annoying way to respond to someone comes into play, and he decides that as long as plausible deniability is on their side he’s going to play coy with Isabela. He looks up at her, lips on the rim of his mug of ale, expression full of feigned ignorance and equally feigned innocence.  
“It’s not what you didn’t do, it’s what you DID, and how, and how many times. Don’t give me that 'you’re just guessing’ look, I KNOW that cow-lick.” Isabela sits down on the edge of the table and gestures at Fenris’s hair. Then she leans over, giving both of them a superb view of her cleavage as she tries to sniff them for telltale sex smells. Unfortunately for her, there’s enough woodsmoke and ale vomit in the place to mask it.

Fenris leans back a couple inches, and takes a moment to wash more ale down his throat while she’s still safely on the opposite side of the table. When he finishes and she’s still there, he glances upward for a split second as if he could see what she’s on about. “So… you’ve deduced that we’ve fucked because of my hair. You’ve reached new, desperate lows.”

Isabela snaps her fingers, oblivious to Fenris’s jab. “So you admit it!” She lifts her chin and gives Anders a vindicated look, but he sticks to his act, determined to find a way to frustrate her. “So. Who was the catcher? Anders, did you try out your Electricity Thing?” She slides back off the table and with a bit of an excited bounce, slips around and into the booth, determinedly smooshing Fenris up against Anders.

“I didn’t admit anything. Just pointing out your fantasies.” Fenris steels his shoulders, suddenly quite uncomfortable and claustophobic between them when it’s not on his own terms at all. “Why don’t you pester other people? Merrill and Varric are having a wonderful time.”  
Isabela shrinks back a couple inches as her teasing gets the less than fun reaction, and she takes a swig of her drink. “Aw don’t lie, it’s /so/ unbecoming of you. I do it because I care. And you’re both hot, I like the image.” Fenris shoots her a small glare out of the corner of his eye, but she just leans forward to see Anders and ignore the elf entirely. “Are you going to be no fun all night?” Nevermind that it’s daytime.

Maker, Isabela is a hard target. And Anders doesn’t feel quite himself if he doesn’t have something glib to say, so he smirks a bit mysteriously around the rim of his ale mug. “Probably. After all the fun I’ve had today I need a bit of a breather.” Anders looks… really awfully content about being crammed into the booth with Fenris beside him. “But if you want to come on over to this end of the table, I’ve definitely got an appetite for a sandwich.”

Hard, she might be indescructible as every move they both make is just more confirmation. Fenris just keeps drinking at this point, glad to have her attention off of his back for once and idly thinking that passing people they know could now excuse this as Anders and Isabela having some sort of new scheme to piss the elf off.  
“Oh don’t act so protective, I’ve done him too.”  
Fenris nearly chokes mid drink.

Anders -does- choke mid drink, spraying ale over the table, then pounding his chest as he coughs. “I know that!” From the miffed look on Anders’ face, Isabela scored a critical hit with that one. And Isabela, in return, looks a bit smug.  
“You did, didn’t you? Funny, it never bothered you before.” She leans across Fenris to tap the center of Anders’ chest. “You, my magical friend, have got it _bad_.”

Fenris leans back against the seat and holds his mug safely away as he recovers and Isabela invades his space. “I tried to warn you.” Turns out he wasn’t kidding when he said Anders would be horrified to know.

Isabela pulls back and then stands up, flashing a smile at the both of them. “I’ll get Merrill and Varric. How long has it been since we all sat down and drank together?” It finally begins to dawn on Anders just what he may be in for, and the little laugh Isabela gives voice to as she saunters away sounds very much like a wicked cackle. “Oh Maker. This is like curfew in the Apprentice Quarters, only worse…”

Fenris doesn’t look too worse for wear after that. But then, he looks as he normally does at the tavern, drinking and humorlessly bothered by everyone. It’s likely going to get worse from here. But the elf watches her go, and with the brief moment alone h shifts in place to something more comfortable then the position she’d forced him into, still mere inches from Anders’ shoulder but no longer shoved against it. “'Electricity thing’?”

Anders coughs again, then slams back the rest of his ale. He’s going to need to be very drunk, very fast. “It’s.. ah… a little… thoroughly debauched? But also very nice in sort of a weird way. You know how a strong jolt of electricity can make a person spasm? If you keep it under control, you can get a different… sort… of spasms…”

“Disgusting.” Yet he sounds neutral about the condemnation, so who knows what he actually thinks. He scans the tavern, but it looks like Isabela may have decided to physically run to Merrill’s to drag her here, and he very minutely leans against the mage’s shoulder, disguising it under a swig from his mug. “This is going to be a long day.”

Anders was thinking about fleeing for the hills, but then he feels that minute pressure of Fenris leaning against him, he becomes aware all over again of the warmth where their thighs rest against one another. He hooks his ankle around Fenris’s under the table and smiles at him. When the serving girl returns with more ale, he motions to her to wait. "Have you got any Nug Hoagies in the kitchen? Could we get a couple of those, with Special Sauce?“ He thinks about asking for the fried onions too, but realizes he has a reason to care about his breath. She nods to Anders and hurries on her way, the tavern room seeming, as usual, short-staffed.

Fenris picks his foot away to cross it behind his own ankle, pointedly out of reach for another attempt. Apparently that was his limit, though it might be fair enough seeing as how them simply sitting together caused so much unwelcome attention from Isabela already. The food order he doesn’t say a word of complaint about though; as long as it doesn’t have fish he’s gone too many times without to be picky.

 

All too soon after Isabela returns from a side door to the pub in a rush, Merrill literally in tow as she’s half-dragged along by the hand. The Dalish elf glances around in an excited fluster until Isabela points the two out, and they head over. It takes all of Merrill’s willpower to not scrunch her fists over her mouth, but then she does it anyway with a small gasp. "You’re adorable! When did it happen, tell my everything.”

Fenris realizes the more he actively ignores everyone, the better this will likely go. “No.”

“It may have had a bit to do with being saved from a fate worse than death the other night."Anders sighs a bit as Fenris rebuffs him, and settles back against the bench they’re sitting on. "But as for telling you everything, I wouldn’t want to deprive you of all the amazing things you’re no doubt imagining. ” Anders wonders if taking the heat and letting Fenris retreat will be taken as the kindness he intends it to be. But asside from that, Merrill is disarmingly adorable at even the worst of times. "Come on, you two, sit down. How is Hawke? -Where- is Hawke? Did he really duel the Arishok?“

"Really? Because I’m imagining tea parties, if you don’t mind.” The best part about Merrill is how she’s absolutely serious about that, even enough to continue. “Oh, but then he would have to smile and we can’t have any of that, it would strain him too much.” That last part gets a small glare from Fenris, but he seems content enough with Anders handling this nonsense.

Isabela waves her hand as if Anders is deflecting the issue instead of being actually concerned, alongside cutting off Merrill. “Hawke is fine. He’s with Aveline, and you know how she is about being here before evening.” She rolls her eyes in her silent opinion of that. “By some miracle and a few cuts we’re all fine, thanks to your new boyfriend. He’s the one that suggested it.”

Anders glances sidelong at Fenris, not sure how he’s likely to feel about being called his ‘boyfriend’. He isn’t sure how he feels about it himself. “He did -almost- smile on a number of occaisions,” he says to Merrill, lifting a finger.

“Oh, did he do that thing he does when his lips are trying to smile and the rest of his face looks angry about it?”

“That very thing. Once the rest of his face looked worried about it, actually, because he almost laughed at one my jokes. Definitely a cause for concern.”

Merrill looks to Fenris with sympathy in her large green eyes. “Oh, you poor thing.”

The tactic of ignoring them for his ale is growing old at this rate, and he casts a glare to the two women even if they seem immune at the moment. “Don’t worry, I’m sure it’ll never happen again at this rate.”

“What was that thing you said, by the way?” Isabela pipes up suddenly, with a little flair with her fingers in the air. She glances between them, curiosity killing her and wondering if the mage would know should the elf keep silent. “You translated what you said for Hawke, but what did you say to make them just /give/ you Anders? Now that was magic.”

Anders shifts in place to turn a curious look towards Fenris. That, he wouldn’t mind knowing either.

“Maybe he said 'please’?” Merrill posits.

Uh. With all the eyes on him, there’s no way out of this one. Mostly though, a small point of him is worried about what Anders will say. “The Qunari keep their mages in cages or on a leash to hunt the Tal'Vashoth. So I told them I was his Arvaraad, the one that holds back evil.”

Isabela whistles. “Wow. Glad I asked. So does this mean you’ll be walking him on a leash soon?” Please?

Anders’s jaw drops, his cheeks fllushing red. He would certainly -like- to object to that, but given that it worked when he was perhaps minutes away from being force-fed qamek, it seems stupid to complain about it now. “Shut up,” he snaps at Isabela. “He did it to help me and he succeeded. You have no idea how it felt! They were going to -kill- my -mind-.”

“I’m not sure anybody would notice the difference,” Isabela lilts. “What can I say, Anders, you know we all only want you for body?”

Fenris clears his throat in his best attempt to help quiet Isabela, though it really only makes her smile a little like he was admitting it. “It could have been worse. Their leash holders kill a mage that’s been seperated from them.”

Merrill gasps dramatically. “Oh that’s terrible! What reason could they possibly have to do such a thing?”

“Because mages are gateways for demons. It’s a wonder they don’t think we’re all corrupted, since the circles don’t sew mages’ mouths shut.”

“Of course not, mouths are useful.” Being Isabela, that useful thing isn’t eating.

“That would be such a shame. I think Anders would be a very good pet.” Merrill wears her customary wide-eyed deadpan. Anders hopes she’s joking, but as usual he can’t be entirely sure. “He’s very fuzzy,” she adds. “And I bet that feathery coat is nice to pet.”

“I never miss the sandbox either,” Anders dryly quips. “I tried telling them that.”

Fenris just…stares at Merrill for a moment over his drink. “Do you have any idea what you’re saying?”

Isabela claps once with glee. “Not the ways you are. It’s giving you ideas though, isn’t it?”

“No, it isn’t. And I think he might have fleas.”

“Oh I just gave him that, don’t worry.”

Isabela’s comment makes Fenris shoot a glance towards Anders. You didn’t, did you? The look isn’t lost on the woman, and she just bursts out laughing.

“Maybe I should get a pet. It would make the Alienage less lonely,” Merrill muses out loud.

Anders, for his part, slams back another drink, flushed and mildly flustered. “I do not have fleas! -Or- crabs, thank you Isabela.”

More drinks arrive, along with a particularly dapper looking dwarf, who hops up on a stool at one end of the table. “That’s certainly something to brag about for a man who lives in Darktown,” Varric comments. “And in Blondie’s defense, think of him as of last week and ask yourself, does that look like the face of a man who’s been handling armfulls of booty? I’m gonna guess that Broody’s affections have been falling like rain on dry, thirsty ground.”

“Booty?” Fenris manages out as he looks up to Varric in disbelief. The dwarf just waves both hands in mercy while he’s ahead. “Woah down elf, I’m not the one you should be directing your frustration at.”  
“Mm, speaking of frustration.” Isabela props her hands on her chin as she looks to Anders. “So which of you is on top? I bet he works out a lot of /frustration/.”  
“Well both of them I’d imagine, seeing as they’re in hightown. Then the only one on top of them would be Aveline… and Sebastian. Oh, and Donnic.."Merrill could really start going on forever and nearly does, until Isabela blindly taps a finger to her lips. She wants to hear this one, alright.

"Why don’t you just guess? You’ve got a fifty-fifty chance of being right.” Oh good, more drinks. Anders’s mug of ale doesn’t last long. When the food arrives, he tears into his with a furious appetite. “And by your own admission, you -know- what he’s like in bed.” Anders can’t help sounding a little bit annoyed at that.

He does just that, spending quite some time in his mansion just watching the fire while he thinks. Everything troubles him and at one point his agitation threatens to turn into an argument.. but to no one in particular since Anders isn’t around, and he’s left pacing. After that kiss he’d assumed… well. Maybe the mage was actually having second thoughts. Or the templars… Justice wouldn’t let that happen, but while Fenris doesn’t actively worry the thought plants in his mind, rooting in it’s blackness as it threatens the only completely good thing that’s happened to him that he can remember. Before he really realizes it, he’s already out the door and nearly to the clinic.

Fenris stops himself, uneasy, thinking of going back even when he’s already in Darktown, and looks out to the small opening to the sky. The moon is already set several hours past midnight, barely visible against the orange glow of factory fires still burning, and it’s this that makes him turn and continue on until he finds the clinic door. After asking if he’ll see the elf later, Fenris feels he deserves some sort of explanation.

The clinic doors are closed, but lamplight dimly shines out under them. There are books piled around Anders, though without a desk he’s started sitting on the floor, letting everything spread out around him. Some books he has sitting open, others with pages dog-eared, and two or three he seems to be actively referring to, taking notes, drawing diagrams. He has no sense of time when he’s like this, aware of nights where he hasn’t slept, days that seemed to vanish. He’s learned from experience that sleep won’t come when he tries to force it, either. Now and then, something intrudes on the edges of his focus, a sense of having forgotten something, but Justice shoos it away like a buzzing mosquito.

By the time Fenris finally opens a door to the clinic he’s thoroughly unamused. Here a small part of him was actually thinking about admitting concern, and the damn mage is sitting on the floor doing things he could be doing anywhere else. That feeling seems odd as it strikes him, like the Qunari attack left a burn on him he has to keep an eye on, but even this realization isn’t enough to cool his mind. The elf’s mood comes out with his words, agitated to the point of possibly becoming irrational.  
“Did I do something to offend you?”

“Not now, working.” Anders doesn’t even raise his head. Just whose voice he heard doesn’t even fully register. He dips his pen, scratches out a few more notes before the nib breaks, adding another splatter to an already chaotic-looking page of scrawl. He mutters under his breath and starts sifting around for another quill.

Fenris stares at the man blankly, his anger flaring but fizzling out just as quickly as he feels so easily brushed aside. The idea that this probably wasn’t as serious as he thought it was crosses his mind and hits him like a hammer, but worse is a familiar feeling tugging at him. He backs up silently a couple steps, reaching a hand back to touch the edge of the door, and his voice goes dead. “Is there anything you need?”

Anders can’t find a quill. He stands up, scattering his work at his feet, inkwell spilled into the dust. His arms are out in front of his, raised as if he’s inches away from a genuine, screaming outburst, but then he reigns himself in. He covers his face with his hands, a raw sound in his throat almost like a sob as he starts coming back to himself. He knows what’s happened and he knows why. Now all that remains to be seen is how much time he lost. Pushing back his hair, he opens his eyes. It’s dark, and Fenris is standing by the door. The look in his eyes says clearly, he’s only now realizing Fenris is there. "…Shit,“ he rasps. "I never wanted you to see me like this. Please, don’t go.”

The instinct to just leave washes Fenris again, but weaker this time and the personality flows back into his features. His eyes fall from the mage to the paperwork. Not that he can make sense of anything strewn over the floor beyond the disarray of it, but this isn’t exactly the precarious situation he’d picture to go with words like that. That it seems innocuous enough but is enough to curse over raises his suspicions, and he narrows his eyes. “What are you doing?”

Anders shakes his head, still trying to reorient himself. "It’s… it’s mostly alchemical. If the Templars overstep their bounds, I need an edge. I need something to hold them back, hold over them. We need equal footing, we can’t keep making concessions out of fear…“ Anders shakes his head again, realizing he’s ranting. "I’m sorry. Justice told me I needed to make up for ‘lost time’.”

“Of course, because listening to what makes you an abomination is the most /logical/ option.” It’s something like this that reminds the elf that as much as he’ll indulge the mage and try to understand, at the end of the day it’s still a demon that tells him to do things like any other demon. He’ll never trust it farther than he can throw a boulder. “Do you even hear yourself? Why would anyone want to side with a mage that spends their nights writing a demon’s words to try to be as dangerous as they claim you are.”

“If anyone wanted to listen, maybe I wouldn’t need to be so dangerous.” Anders’s tone is calm, though, and his expression tired and troubled. He leans against one of the rough-hewn pillars and rubs his temples. "I hear myself… usually a little too well. I wish I could drown it all out. I wish I weren’t like this…“ His head bowed as he realizes his words echo Fenris’s own from the morning before. "I don’t even know what the hour is. I am so sorry…”

Fenris was completely ready to launch into an argument about it, but he finds himself unable to if Anders rolls so easily. “It’s too late. next time…” He can’t believe he’s saying this, and he sighs in a mix of disbelief and exasperation. “…just tell your demon to bring your madness with you?” At least then he won’t be plagued by any of this.

Anders raises his head and gives Fenris a sober nod. "As you wish,“ he answers. The look on Fenris’s face at that moment is priceless, and Anders discovers he’ll probably never cease being amazed at the fact that the elf actually cares for him. "I’d offer you my cot for the night, if I didn’t think we were both better off just walking back to Hightown…” Anders almost smiles as the obvious finally dawns on him. "I can tell you had worked up a very good mad-on for me, so feel free to argue on the way up. I rather deserve it right now.“

Fenris shoots him a short glare. Even now words like that, not taking a word he has seriously, give him a mind to strangle Anders. But it’s too early in the morning for that, even for the elf. So instead he just grumbles while he waits for Anders to leave the clinic first and make his stopping official. "That the templars kill you someday and I’ll probably agree with their reasoning. Does that sum it up for you?”

 

“So will I. I’ve made a commitment to genuinely deserve it when they finally come for me.” Anders says it blithely enough but he’s really only half-kidding. Anders snuffs out the last of the lanterns and shuts the door on the darkened room. "Trouble is, while Blood Magic has certainly got that rush of the forbidden, I still haven’t managed to find anything -fun- you can do with it, given I’m not a horrible sadist. The best I’ve been able to come up with so far is a scheme to mind-control the housewives of Kirkwall into baking me a mountain of strawberry rhubarb pies.“

The fire Fenris had been feeling earlier that night, pacing angrily across the floor and nowhere to burn the energy, comes welling back like a flood ready to drown him. It’s only because of the hour that he reminds himself that he loves this idiot man, somehow, and he just settles for an extremely venomous, "Shut up, mage.” It’s simple, but the weight of it speaks of some cord struck with with the last attempt at bad humor.

Anders shuts up, chiding himself inwardly. He has really got to get into the habit of thinking before he opens his mouth and not after. Combined with the still-fresh memories of Fenris being uncommonly sweet, Anders feels rotten twice over. Fenris deserves better.

While Anders is completely obedient Fenris almost instantly regrets his command, since the only alternative they seem to have is to just not say anything. Maker’s breath he’s actually in the middle of thinking how welcome their normal arguing and sniping would be right now. “Festis bei umo canavarum..” Or drive him absolutely mad, whichever happens first.

Hearing that, Anders can’t help himself. He darts up behind Fenris and slips his arms around him, nuzzling in against the back of his neck, breathing in the scent of his hair. "You are so much infinitely better than I deserve,“ he murmurs, before giving in further to temptation and nibbling harmlessly on Fenris’s right ear.

Fenris stops, and turns his head away in weak protest but not far enough to keep the end of his ear out of reach. "I’m not, but you’ve survived infinitely longer than you deserve.” He glances at the path ahead of them, the stairs just below the Rose. “We can’t walk like this.”

“I respectfully disagree on your first point, but I’m glad I survived long enough to kiss you.” Anders nibbles along the rim of Fenris’s ear and kisses his way down the side of his neck. He hangs on a while longer before he lets go, offering Fenris his hand if he wishes to take it.

Fenris tolerates the affection well enough, but he looks at the hand offering and back up to Anders. You’re kidding, right? He’s not about to hold hands and frolic off into the night. “No. You can wait until we’re inside.” The rest of the way is just as quiet as before, but more bearable.

Anders shrugs and follows along, suppressing the urge to whistle a jaunty tune since he can’t have his frolic. "One of these days I’ll have to get you to show me one of your dance routines,“ he muses aloud as they walk. "I could give you a nice accompaniment on my lute.”

“You have a talent for something other than magic and extremism? Hm.” Hopefully Anders wasn’t under the impression that the sharp sniping would stop when they got together, because just saying that put a small but genuine smirk on Fenris’ lips. This is is what he’s been comfortable with for the past few years.

It’s not the sharp words that have bothered Anders so much as what seemed to lay behind. Now that he has some reasonable certainty that Fenris doesn’t despise him, he can take the sniping in stride. It’s becoming just something that lets him know Fenris is there, and for that, it’s hardly unwelcome. “Ah… er… 'talent’ is a strong word, but I can carry a tune. How about yourself, any hobbies besides brooding, drinking, and dancing?”

“I seem to be really good at killing people and taking orders.” Fenris stops and glances over his shoulder as he pulls the door open to the mansion. “You thought I had spare time for hobbies?” Even then, he might be getting rusty at the taking orders part.

“I’m pretty good at that killing thing, too. We should talk shop sometime.” Anders has the top fastenings of his coat undone as they step through the mansion door. He wonders if he should take Fenris’s request to bring his insanity with him as an invitation to move in. Dilapidated or not, he could see this being home someday, and Anders has hardly been used to having nice things.

“Yes, I’m already well aware of how you cheat at it. I don’t think anything I know would do you any good.” The door is closed behind them but Fenris’ hand pauses along the door, watching Anders take his coat off, before he snaps out of it and keeps walking to move them on to the only area he actually lives in. The one good thing about this place, other than the sheer size of silent personal space, is the window in the bedroom overlooking the city. This time though, it just emphasizes where the moon is in the sky and he can’t help but raise an armored fist as he yawns.

Anders rubs his eyes, wondering how long it will be until the first light of dawn starts brightening the horizon. He tosses his coat over the back of a chair and starts unlacing his boots. Fenris’s yawn sets off a yawn of his own, which he’s grateful for. It’s a good indication he’ll be able to sleep tonight. “I still wouldn’t mind hearing some stories. Maybe making a toast to all the slavers you’ve killed, and good riddance to them.”

“I’ve had enough toasts for one day.” A single embarrassing one is all he needs for a month. Instead Fenris picks up the bottle they left near the bed, taking a heavy swig of it before setting it back down carelessly and turning his attention to loosening his armor to set it aside. He seems to be rather fast at undressing, as odd an observation as that can be but probably by previous necessity, and he’s only held up by the buttons on his top each time. It’s enough of a bother that he sits on the edge of the bed. “There’s not much to tell, really. I could sum it up now if you want.”

“If you want to, I’m listening.” Anders raises his head, losing himself in the curve of Fenris’s throat for a moment. Even the most prosaic lines of his body has, he thinks an unusual poetry and elegance. It makes him wish he had Varric’s way with words. The bottle by the bedside makes him remember how it got there, and he pulls a small canister of something out of the pouch on his belt, before he takes it off.

Want to isn’t exactly the words he’d use, but he wants someone to hear it. With the final snap he peels out of the vest, loosely folding it before setting it aside. And he stops there, because he fully intends to only tell a story with his pants on, or at least something covering him. “I immediately sold my sword to some roadside merchant.” He waves his hand. “It had been an extravagant thing with gold and pearl inlay that Danarius wanted to parade around near him. The dwarf could only give me a quarter of it’s worth and something plain in return but I was glad to be rid of it.  
I used the money to pay off hirelings, anyone I could find in the local taverns. Eventually the slavers would ambush us, and slaughtered everyone I’d hired.  
But, I kept doing it. The gold didn’t last long, and I couldn’t afford to keep a fire when I was alone, so I waited through the nights and slept when I had to… I just kept going south until I hit the ocean.” The rest well, you know.

Anders strips to his trousers and sits on the edge of the bed, pulling the leather thong out of his hair and letting it fall forward, framing his face in a soft and slightly shaggy blonde mop. “And you made it. Thank the Maker you’re better at staying escaped than I am. Have you ever… enjoyed killing them? The slavers? When we fight them there’s a sort of …satisfaction in justice being done but it’s not exactly like enjoyment. It’s just a chore, something that needs to be done.”

Fenris’ voice hardens. “No. I would say I’m glad there’s one less of them for each we kill, but I’d be a fool to think they wouldn’t just be replaced by another. I just want to be left alone.” He finally turns his head to Anders. “Sorry.” Talk about killing any mood.

“Hopefully someday soon they’ll count the cost of harassing you and decide to cut their losses. It’s disgusting, even the lives of their own are just figures in a ledger at the end of the day.” Anders flops backward onto the bed, eyes gazing wearily up at the ceiling. “You don’t have anything to apologize for. I’m here for you… for whatever you want or need me for.”

“Sleep, primarily.” At that Fenris lifts his hips to slip his pants off, what’s practically a second skin left on the floor a little more haphazardly and just leaving his underclothes. “Or don’t, it’s the same to me. I’ve done my part dragging you here.”

Anders nods, rolling onto his side, shifting to rest his head on the pillow. “Thank you for not giving up on me.”

Fenris looks down. Anders manages to look so.. gentle, sometimes. “Why would I give up on you?”

Anders chuckles bitterly. “I would think it was obvious. I’m an abomination, and even the part of me that’s just a man was stupid enough in the first place to invite a demon in. I’m half-mad, enough so anyway that everyone I know cracks wise about me being insane, I’m obsessed with a cause you despise, I’m clumsy with regard to your feelings, and I’m not even particularly good-looking. Need I go on?”

Fenris reaches out to pull at one side of the covers that were only lazily settled into place as it is, when he stops to hear Anders’ answer.“You’re wrong about the last one.” There’s a pointed silence. “The rest sound right enough..”

“I’d rather that were reversed.” Anders rolls to his other side, his back to Fenris. He doesn’t bother pulling any covers over himself.

Fenris rustles partly into the covers, letting them hang loosely around his hips. He curls up against Anders’ back, bringing up an arm to drape over the man’s side, and presses the bridge of his nose against the nape in front of him. “I don’t want anything other than you.”

It’s never going to stop being amazing to Anders, the way Fenris can bring his emotional momentum to a dead halt and turn it around. At that, he blinks in the darkness and gives a soft laugh, pressing softly back against the warm body spooning against his own. “You have me, Fenris. I am so utterly yours.”

Fenris doesn’t respond, save a warm sigh breathed out between Anders’ shoulderblades. But then, that should be enough as far as the elf is concerned. His arm tightens, just enough to pull them closer together. “Sleep, mage.”


	8. Chapter 8

Anders sleeps late this morning. Sunlight slants in through the windows, creeping its way up the bed, and Anders awakes feeling languid and rested. It takes him a moment to realize he doesn’t hear Fenris breathing beside him, and he rolls over to find the other side of the bed empty. It’s a disappointment, but not a concern until he rises, dresses, and finds the mansion empty, the hearths all cold. After a moment of pacing and wondering how ridiculous he is for worrying, he grabs his staff and hits the streets. Fenris is probably just at the Hanged Man, talking to Isabela. And if he isn’t, Varric would be the one to ask where to look.

Isabela is sitting at the bar in her usual cheery self, back set against the counter and legs crossed as she scans the crowd for nothing in particular save maybe someone interesting to share her alcohol with. Right. Alcohol. That and sex.  
So it’s a bit of a surprise when she sees Anders walk in, and she gives him a puzzled look as she finishes a gulp on her mug and waves him over with her free hand. “Bloody hell? Why aren’t you two joined at the hip and fucking each other’s brains out? Or something?” She adds something but really the first part is the only thing she imagines they do.

“Because he left before I woke up.” Anders is definitely cross over that, and in the scheme of things he’d much rather have spent the day fulfilling Isabela’s expectations. “So I take it to mean he hasn’t been in here, then?” Anders also leans against the bar, scanning the room as if hoping Fenris to appear at any moment.

“Not a hair of him.” Isabela finishes her drink and sets it down for someone at the bar to fill it behind her. In the same motion she waves a hand to get Anders a drink. Hell if he doesn’t finish, she’ll have the rest for him. "Sweetheart I know you haven’t been with him much, but he has a habit of this.“ She pauses. "Well probably for different reasons, but still. It’s… Fenris.” That really explains so much.

“Then… he’s alright? -Is- he alright?” Anders picks up the mug and lets go of any anger. It’s difficult to stay angry when he thinks Fenris might be hurting. “If I did something wrong I’d rather he just yelled at me and got it off his chest.” Anders pulls himself up onto the nearest barstool, hunching over his drink.

“Not a clue. If he’s not here or there…” Isabela spins in her chair to prop her elbows against the counter in actual thought. She hasn’t had to think so intently in a while. “He’d never touch the alienage, if Hawke needed anything we’d know, and no reason to go to the clinic when the ass is here.” She goes silent, then a spark. “Oh! You know, I ran into him once out on the Wounded Coast, really close to the city? He was sitting on one of the rocks and mind in the clouds. Nearly scared him shitless when he finally noticed me. Try there?”

Anders slams back the rest of his drink with the idle realization that such is becoming a habit. But damned if he’ll leave a free beer behind. “Thank you, Isabela.” It’s clear for a moment that there isn’t a thought in his head but how to get to the coast as quickly as he can. But then he pauses, and gives Isabela a small, gentle smile. “I owe you, for this. And the drink.” And with that, he slides off the stool and hurries back to the streets, dodging past patrons and servers on his way to the door.

Isabela just calls out as she picks up a new drink. “Don’t die trying to find him out there, he’d have my head!”

Surprisingly, Fenris is exactly where Isabela had guessed he was. Right off the path and down the hill by the water, on a boulder smoothed by the waves of nightly high tides and warmed by the sun, just enough to be pleasant on an otherwise cooler day. He would have mentally packed up and moved his personal hiding place from the world, except she’d been the only one to bother him there and had never pestered him again. So he’s here, again, arms back to prop him up and one hand on the oversized sword laying at his side.

Anders’s boots crunch quietly on the sand and gravel as he approaches. It’s a nice spot. Raiders and Tal'Vashoth aside, the Wounded Coast generally is.Anders opens his coat to let the breeze in, and steps up to lean against Fenris’s boulder without a word, just a questioning look on his face.

One of Fenris’ ears finally nags at him about something close, anything other than the rustling grass and ocean so unexpected it sparks almost painfully. He turns the sound immediately, hand visibly tightening against the leather grip of the sword until he registers who it is already leaning against the rock near him. For a split second it makes him panic, because if he’d been so lost to let Anders creep up on him without trying how well would a slaver fare, but once he shakes the thought his gaze darkens a bit. “Isabela told you, didn’t she.”

“Yes,” Anders acknowledges. “I didn’t know where you were and I worried. If you want me to shove off, I can.” Anders looks calm as he gazes out over the ocean. “And if you want me to listen, I can do that too.”

It could really go either way, and Fenris practically has to flip a coin in his mind about it. He looks down as he coalesces his thoughts, hair inadvertently falling forward and obscuring the view of his eyes. “Last night reminded me of some things I hadn’t wanted to think about. If I alarmed you it was not my intent… I just needed to think.”

“I understand,” comes Anders soft reply. “And I’m sorry about last night… the state I was in. I’m still grateful you came after me.” The breeze coming in from the sea feels wonderful, plowing through the thin tunic under his coat. He unties his hair to let the wind blow it back, tousling up a strawberry-blonde halo. 

“You don’t.” Fenris draws up one leg as he pushes his palms from the rock, his elbow resting onto his knee and dropping his chin to the new perch of a wrist. “I should keep in mind that things are going to feel the same. You’re not going to stop being a mage, no matter how good you try to be.”

Anders decides not to comment on the fact that simply being a mage is still a condemning sin in Fenris’s book. “True. I can’t not be a mage, even if I decided I wanted to. All I can do is decide how I use my magic.” He turns his eyes to Fenris, looking up at him, trying to read that pensive expression.

Fenris is silent for a few long moments. He’d rather leave things like they are, let Anders assume what he wants. But the man deserves an explanation if he managed to find the elf all the way out here. "Danarius would lose himself in his work often.“ He grits his teeth with a small snarl as the memory solidifies in his mind. "Even in the middle of his experiments.”

Anders lowers his eyes, beginning to understand. He imagines Fenris seeing Danarius in him and feeling sick with horror. "I’m not him,“ he says softly. "I’m not Danarius. I wasn’t … like that, before Justice. Sometimes he drives me like he’s goading a pack animal. I don’t even know if it helps, to tell you why. 'A demon made me do it,’” Anders scoffs at his own excuse, quoting something he remembers Hawke saying once, in a similar tone.

“It doesn’t change what I already know. You’ll never do the things he did, but empty tables and research reminds me all the same..” The entire clinic, a twisted mirror of the more sinister things in Tevinter. No wonder he told Anders to take it to the mansion. “I never lifted a finger to stop any of it.”

Anders raises his head again. “Don’t carry that monster’s guilt,” he says. “Not even a fraction of it.” He climbs up onto the rock, sitting back, weight on the heels of his hands.

“It’s easy to put it like that after the fact, here. His ‘cheaper possessions’ would beg me for some small hope, that they would be alive when he was done, and I would do nothing for them… I’m sure it gave him pride to post me by them, knowing I wouldn’t do anything.”

Anders watches Fenris’s face with sorrowful eyes. “May I tell you a story?”

The elf blinks and finally looks up, getting a bit too entrenched in his memories. “Yes, it’s the least I can do.”

Anders nods, just a small incline of his chin. “My second escape from the Ferelden Circle, I had thrown in with another Apprentice. She was older than me, about seventeen, and she’d learned she was pregnant by a journeyman smith she’d fallen for. She wanted to have her baby, and be a wife and a mother. She was innocent enough to say things like she would swear off all magic, and the Templars wouldn’t harass her because she’d learned enough to not be dangerous anymore. One morning, I got out of the cot in the attic where she and her man were sheltering me, and the house, the shop, were full of Templars. It was quiet as the grave. They’d sent the townsfolk to the chantry, 'to pray.’ They just didn’t want anyone to hear…”  
Anders shuts his eyes, his expression turning severe, wounded. “The Templar commander told me that Imelda, that was the other Apprentice’s name, was an abomination. That I needed to help them drive the demon out of her. The other Templar were holding her down and she was crying, begging for mercy. I thought, I’ll just do what they say, and we can escape again once they were placated. The commander gave me… an iron spike, the kind of long nail they use to anchor the main timbers of a Ferelden house together. He told me to just hold the point to her temple, that the iron would help him 'channel’, and he shut me up when I tried to ask him how. Just hold the thing in place. Simple task. And close my eyes.”  
“And I did as I was told. And I felt the smithy hammer come down on that spike, and I heard her gasp, felt her bone split under my hand, and warm blood gushing up, blood and brains.” When I opened my eyes, her lover was the one holding the hammer, And I was… my hand was covered in… 'Her blood’s on your hands. She would have been a good mage, but you tempted her away from the Maker’s path. You can live with the guilt.’“

Fenris listens with a sharp focus, never flinching or so much as glancing away during the words. When Anders finishes he leans in and presses his lips against the mage’s shoulder, nose momentarily buried amongst the weather bleached feathers of the jacket before he pulls away. "I’m sorry. There’s…” He pauses to choose his words, certain his sentiment won’t come across no matter how much thought he puts to it. “- a responsibility, to hold people and protect them from themselves. A responsibility too hard for most, to not twist it to what they want. They failed you. And her.”

“I don’t think responsibility really figured in. It was just sadism, and they clung to responsibility to justify it, and push the horror and the guilt onto us. I felt… cut off from even the other mages, after that. I couldn’t tell anyone what had happened. It was just… too sick. And I think that was also his intention. I never worked with other mages after that. All the other times, when I ran I ran alone.” Anders speaks without any ire, just hurt, just the struggle to understand. “To have another at your mercy… for some people it’s a grave responsibility, like you say. And to others it’s just… an opportunity.”

Fenris sighs softly, his breath still close enough to lightly disturb the feathers while the blustering breeze dies down for a few moments. “It’s a wonder they never killed you before you got better at running. I’ve been wondering, though..” He straightens up, determined to partially dissolve Anders’ memories with distraction. “Why did you run from the Grey Wardens? It seems… safer.” And if you’re going to slowly go crazy, might as well do it together.

“Because the Templars hounded me even then.” Anders winces and swallows hard. This, he’s been half wanting to tell Fenris, and half fearing. Now that he has little choice but to tell him, it’s mostly the fear he feels. “I escaped the Circle seven times. I’d gotten to be pretty good at it, even if I never did get the knack of staying escaped. Before that seventh time I had been in a cell for a year. Solitary confinement. Chantry law wouldn’t allow me to be made Tranquil or put to death, because I was no maleficar, I’d never done anybody any harm, I just… kept leaving. And I left again, the second I got the chance, and I ran to Amaranthine.”  
“I’d heard rumors of a secret storehouse there where the Templars had moved most of the Ferelden Circle’s phylacteries. This was, without a doubt, my Last Hurrah. I was fairly certain that if they caught me again I would never again see the light of day. Either they’d kill me or I’d end up doing myself in, in the deepest darkest pit they cared to lock me in. And, well, my luck held. They found me in Amaranthine and they were hauling me back to the Tower when we ended up in the middle of a Darkspawn siege on Vigil’s Keep. The Darkspawn did away with my captors quite handily, and then I did away with the Darkspawn. But later, after the fighting was over, more Templars came, and they blamed me for the deaths of the others. There isn’t really a way to plead your case about such matters… I was to be handed over to them for execution. The only way out was to accept conscription into the Grey Wardens… and I did. But the Templars made clear that this wasn’t the end.”  
“I fought alongside the Wardens while they investigated the Darkspawn uprisings around Amaranthine. That was when I met Justice. Some dark magic threw us into the Fade, and Justice helped us return to this world, only to end up thrown back with us. He occupied the body of a dead Warden, then, and he committed himself to helping our cause. After we finally ended the Darkspawn attacks at their source, I thought I might be safe for a while… but I was wrong. The Templars sent someone after me. He hounded the Wardens to return me to the Circle to face justice, and when they wouldn’t, managed to force a deal on them instead. He joined the Wardens, and insisted that he be sent with me on every assignment. He would watch my every move for something that would incriminate me, something that would enable the templars to have their justice. And then… when I let Justice in… that was what all he needed. He brought the Templars down on me, and Justice… became Vengeance… and I saw that what I had done was the worst mistake of my life. I was a passenger in my own body. I watched myself kill a dozen men.. There was nothing I -could- do then but run.”  
Anders looks to Fenris and awaits judgment.

There’s several long moments of silence as Fenris digests this information, every detail not exactly what he had expected from this question he’d almost casually posed. He pulls away a few inches, his hand sliding across the stone with the movement as he shifts his weight along his hips, his eyes only conveying a critical gaze and the glint of the sun against them.  
“If you’re looking for forgiveness, I-…” The elf trails off, unsteady on his words from the weight of Anders’ history, and tries again. “It’s a bit of a self fulfilling prophecy that they pushed you to become what they hated, but it’s done. You’re what everyone fears, even amongst mages. I can only hope you can control it as long as you live. If you don’t… I’ll be at your side.”

“I… beg you… to hold me back. I know there will be times that I need it. It’s… one of so many things about you that I need… that I know that as hard as Justice pushes, you will always be pulling hard the other way.” Fenris says he’ll stay by his side, and that puts a new kind of lump in Anders’s throat, a sad tenderness in his eyes. “There’s this wonderfully sweet person at the heart of you, Fenris. You deserve better. But if you want me… I guess I’d better just keep letting you know I’m grateful for that.” Anders begins to smile.

“You can tell me I deserve better all you want, but nobody else would put up with me the way you do.” Maybe Isabela, but the trick being a relationship with her would just leave him the same as ever, just.. laid more often. “Perhaps naming myself arvaarad was more apt than I thought.”

“Maybe, maybe not, but I don’t get the feeling you’ll leave me when you realize our comrades in arms like you better than you think they do. And as for that, I’ve thought the same. It doesn’t seem so horrible, when it’s something we can choose.” And Anders knows with some certainty that he can entrust Fenris with his life.

The wind picks up, batting at their hair towards the water, and Fenris takes it as an excuse to duck his head away. “For the first time that I can remember, I think I’ve found something that makes me happy.”

Anders blinks at that. As it sinks in, he begins to grin from ear to ear. “I’m going to do as much of that as I possibly can,” he says. “Making you happy.” He looks at Fenris with his hair blown back, his emerald eyes squinting into the wind, and he rests his hand lightly on Fenris’s as he leans over and ducks down to catch his lips in a kiss.

Fenris sighs into the kiss, all but lost in the wind as he reaches up to catch the front of Anders’ jacket to pull him closer. It’s all too short and barely gets past their lips when he breaks them apart. “We should go back.”

Anders nods to Fenris, the wind whipping at his hair. He climbs to his feet and hops down off the boulder, offering a hand to Fenris to help him down. “Enough thinking for now?” He declines to point out that when the others mention brooding they’re referring to exactly this kind of thing.

Fenris rolls to his feet, ignoring Anders’ offered hand but visibly knowing this particular rock enough that accepting help would probably only throw his descent more than without. “Thinking, talking. We’ve spoken months worth in days. And I’m keeping you.” If Anders had his way without interruption the clinic would likely be closed for a long while.

Anders blushes at that announcement, his eyes wide, but pleased. “Then… is it safe to admit I’ve been thinking the same since two nights ago?” He gives a small, nervous laugh, the color rising in his cheeks.

Fenris gives Anders a quizzical look as he straps his sword back into place at his back before realization hits. “/From your work/. I thought your version was obvious, unless you think I’ll talk anyone’s ear off.”

Anders goes from blushing a bit, to blushing a good deal more, too embarrassed to even meet Fenris’s eyes. “Oh. Yes. Of course.”

Fenris actually, truly chuckles at that. “Don’t worry mage, I’ll 'keep you’ too.”

“Ah HA. Now that I know I just have to completely humiliate myself to get a chuckle out of you…” Anders is still blushing, flustered in several different ways now, but he smiles.

“So with any luck, you won’t have to change anything.” Oh look, the snark is back already. “If you were trying to make me laugh this entire time, you did a terrible job of it.” What with them airing their life grievances.

“I beg to differ!” Anders says with mock indignation. “I don’t hitch up my robes and dance on tables unless I’ve got a very good reason! But now that I’m onto you, it’s only a matter of time before Anders’ Spicy Shimmy makes a comeback.” Anders helpfully shimmies as they hike up the path, wiggling his hips ridiculously.

Fenris stops in his tracks, just staring deadpan. “It was all a lie, the grey wardens kicked you out for showing them… that.”  
Anders shimmies a bit closer to Fenris, thrusting his hips in the elf’s direction and biting his lip theatrically. "Now, that -can’t- be true, when I showed my moves to the Wardens the Hero of Ferelden -joined in-.“

”…and they say Grey Wardens lose their mind with /old age/.“ Fenris just shakes his head and keeps walking. Either Anders will keep dancing or not, at least this way the elf won’t have to witness it.


	9. Chapter 9

The Gallows. Oppressive bronze statues of half-starved wretchedly suffering men, erected long ago by the Tevinter magisters to illustrate to ships of incoming slaves what they had to look forward to in life. Hawke doesn’t like it here any more than Anders does. The renegade mage doesn’t look afraid, which worries him. His slim jaw is set, his eyes hard, and the feathers of his coat barely suffice to obscure the chip on his shoulder. There are a lot of Tranquil in the courtyard today, something that Anders has harped on before. Hawke looks over the small knots of Templars, most off-duty, looking for Knight Captain Cullen’s tight blonde-ish curls. His loyal band of sometimes merry men tag along behind: Anders, Fenris, and Varric.

While the news spread through the party like wildfire, Hawke was thankfully quiet about it when he asked Anders and Fenris to come along with him today. Fenris finds himself grateful for the fact that they’ve been deemed worthy of traveling alongside each other without a single word spoken of it. Something will likely be said later, and that seems.. better. In fact the whole situation seemed so much better he didn’t bother asking what their fearless leader intended to do today. Not that the details would have mattered.  
When they’d previously come to the Gallows the elf hadn’t given a wit for how uneasy their mages felt being there. Now though he finds himself watching Anders’ reaction out of the corner of his eye, and wondering if Hawke fully appreciates the risk of dragging them there.

Hawke -seems- unconcerned, but with Hawke, things are rarely what they seem. And the act of seeming nonchalant while being keenly vigilant is something Hawke has been practicing since youth. Enough of his senses are trained on Anders that he can almost feel invisible threads running from his left shoulder to where the mage is standing. He leads his entourage up to where Knight Captain Cullen stands, the young Templar recruit Keran speaking with him in hushed tones, pleading with him. Hawke nods his greeting.  
“Keran tells me you saved his life. I would like to hear more about what you uncovered, Hawke.”

 

Keran’s name catches Fenris’ attention, drawing it from Anders’ idle tension. He was there when they’d saved the novice Templar from the blood mages, and while Merrill had given the clear that the man wasn’t possessed, Fenris had his doubts. Still, he’d dropped it at the time. Now though, Hawke and the Knight Commander are talking about letting Keran stay with the templars, and that this is even a question seems ludicrous. While they haven’t reached a decision, Keran seems to be winning them over with his sob story about his family. The entire idea weighs so heavy that he can’t help but scoff. “You can’t be serious.”

Anders half-turns, the note of contempt in Fenris’s voice alone would be enough to raise his hackles. It makes an uneasy mix with the frustrated feeling of not understanding what Fenris finds so unreasonable in all this. “Why not?” He has his head tilted, a bit of a challenge implicit in his tone. “What’s so unreasonable about letting him return to his duties? Here I thought you liked Templars.”

Fenris looks back to the mage, none of his usual ire withheld as he looks fiercely baffled, as if everyone else around him were absolutely off their head. At least he remains silent to Anders’ last comment, though his gaze seems enough to say, ‘and you like them now?’ "Accepting a demon into the templars, with access to an entire circle? Have you any concept of how dangerous that would be?“

"A lot less dangerous than a demon elsewhere, given that it would be surrounded by mages and templars perfectly capable of fighting it? Beside the point anyhow, as we’re talking about a young Templar recruit and not a demon.” Anders is frowning, and gestures meaningfully at the innocent-looking Keran, whose feelings he’d rather spare. He knows how much fun it is to have all his supposed friends talk about him being possessed and he imagines it’s even more frustrating when one isn’t.  
Meanwhile Hawke is watching with the look of someone who should have seen something coming, but had somehow convinced himself otherwise. Stricken, as the 'benefit of the doubt’ evaporates before him. “Oh, /here they go,/” he mutters, half covering his face with one hand.

Fenris doesn’t hear Hawke’s words at all, already swept up in the argument. “It’s the /entire/ point. You’re willing to risk the taint of blood magic and demons on all of the templars and mages under them for what, sympathy that this is what he wants to do? So if he /is/ a demon, you trust the mages to 'take care of it’. Because that works so well, we need an entire institution focused on that threat!”

“He /isn’t/ a demon, and even if he was, I /do/ trust the mages to take care of it because they’ve trained their entire lives to do exactly that, and no mage graduates from apprenticeship without proving that he’s /capable/ of doing exactly that. The necessity of the institution of which you speak has more to do with what /some people/ need to soo–”  
“ENOUGH.”  
Anders stops short, glaring, as Hawke interjects.  
“I’d like to say 'why don’t you two stop before you say anything you’ll regret,’ but I think I’m a couple years too late for that. That is /more/ than enough from both of you. Keran’s plight is not fodder for EITHER of your personal agendas. Go back to Hightown, the adults have work to do.” Hawke fixes the both of them with a stoney glare.

And there it is. Supposed friends acting like this is just some personal vendetta. Fenris points an aggressive gauntletted finger towards the younger Templar while he returns every ounce of heat from Hawke’s glare and then some. “Even if the mages and templars 'handle it’, the deaths because it happened in the first place will be on your shoulders, Hawke.” With that he turns on his heel and storms away. While he might argue with Anders all the long day he can’t directly disobey this man. He wasn’t in the mood anymore anyway.  
Cullen clears his throat, a little awkwardly. “Well that was… enlightening. However, we do have to make a decision.”

“You too, Anders. Go.”  
Anders shakes his head, rolling his eyes in a tacit statement that the blame is on Fenris, in his opinion. He follows Fenris from the gallows at a distance, the sound of Hawke and Cullen’s voices fading below the murmur of the crowds.

It’s a fair sized walk back to Hightown, even cutting through the back ways and avoiding Lowtown altogether. The people that actually take this route are few, since there’s not much more than stairs the entire way and how often does anyone but the guards or templars have to go between Hightown and the Gallows. Once they seem relatively alone Fenris stops and half turns back. “Would it kill you to ever not disagree on principle?”

“I could ask you the same thing. You want that man and his sister to starve?” Anders leans against a wall of rough-carved stone.

“He’s a free man, and he has more options than he’s old enough to figure out. But you seem ready to give him a pass because mages deal with demons /so well/, don’t they?”

“And because we’re -reasonably sure he isn’t possessed in the first place-, Fenris.” Anders shakes his head. “It’s like if something’s even been in the same room as magic it’s suspect, so far as you’re concerned.”

“And it shouldn’t be, if it’s blood magic trying to summon a demon?!” Fenris practically starts to pace in place, clearly agitated that Hawke’s even making this decision without him to see which way it went. “You should be angry at the mages who just ruined his life, not me.”

“Fortunately I have the ability to be angry at both of you at once, for different reasons,” Anders snaps. “You know you’re being unreasonable, stop excusing yourself, or I refuse to listen to another word about other peoples’ weakness from your mouth.”

“Yes, because if what I’m saying doesn’t fit with your ideas then I /must/ be unreasonable. Go ahead, it’s not the first time I’ve been disregarded and it’s not going to be the last.”

Anders snarls in frustration and storms past Fenris, stomping up the next flight of steps. He turns back and says, “You think I’d be this pissed off if I was just disregarding you? But maybe you’re right. Maybe I bloody well SHOULD, since I know I’m not going to get anywhere with you.”

Fenris grumbles something likely obscene under his breath, too far away to be audible, and he continues up the stairs to meet and pass Anders. They might as well keep bloody walking, or they’re never getting anywhere unless the Gallows sounds like a oceanside inn. “Please do, you never have a real argument anyway…”  
“And all of yours boil down to Tevinter this and Danarius that. Anybody argues with you, you just make them out to be no better than a slaver. Compelling, sure, but rational? Not really.” Anders voice turns cold. He begins checking the various alleyways that branch off from this route, looking for a quick way back to Darktown.

“Rational, says the abomination that loses sleep over trying to one up the entire chantry.” He turns to keep going and leave Anders to find his way back to the clinic, if that’s how it’s going to be. “Yes, run, it’s what you always do.”

“Then you realize how sad it is that even said abomination can see how far off the hinge you’ve come.” Anders turns back to Fenris with a glower, then he laughs. “Oh right, and we see how well you’ve done at just sticking it out in Tevinter. Maybe -you- should run.”

“Don’t start, mage. You can’t begin to know what happened there, for all your quiet worshiping of the place.” Fenris stops himself from continuing and just turns to leave up the steps. “We’re done here.”

Anders begins to snarl something about Fenris just wanting the last word but he swallows it instead, and finds it bitter. “Fine. Go fuck yourself,” he spits, and turns on his heels, stalking into the shadows of a nearby alleyway.


	10. Chapter 10

There’s actually a bit of a commotion at The Hanged Man tonight, as a fight breaks out between a couple of the drunks. They don’t even have swords between them though, so it’s turned into a flopping besotted wrestling match that other floppy drunk people have gathered to cheer and sing and whoop around.Varric and Isabela are one of the few people smartly deciding to keep their place at the bar, quite happy watching the entire nonsense from over here.

Anders scowls at the commotion. And then scowls at the rest of the bar, wishing the fight would get a little more out of hand so he could hit someone. He very distinctly feels like hitting someone. He tries to wipe it off his face, though, when he sees Isabela by the bar. There is something he came here for, after all. A couple of somethings. He bellies up to the bar beside her and checks his coinpurse, spilling enough onto the counter to buy a bottle of something strong and not too rat-tasting. “Hello, Isabela. Looks like I can pay you back for that drink the other day.” The bartender pours a shot for Anders, but Anders slides it Isabela’s way.

“Oh, you’re buttering me up.” Isabela takes the small glass, swirling it a bit before shooting it down. “…which’ll get you everywhere, but where’s your boyfriend?” She half-turns to glance out to the rest of the tavern, make sure he’s not off killing someone. “You’re here, without him. /Again./ Is he really that good at hide and seek, because I don’t know where else you could look. Maybe he finally decided to commune with the alienage.” She laughs at that, muttering, “Snowflakes in hell of that.”

"Why talk about him? Wouldn’t you rather talk about you?” Anders’s smile is a bit rigid for a moment. he tries to hide it by pouring himself a shot and tossing it back. “He told me to take a hike, so I decided to hike your way. Sorry to disappoint, but I don’t know where he is and I’m not sure I care right now.”

“Oh Lovely, what happened? Did you finish when he told you to stop?”

Varric had perked up quietly on the opposite side of Isabela ever since Anders showed up, and he raises an eyebrow. “Rivaini, I’m surprised you know the concept of stopping.”

“He went on one of his rants about mages, demons, and so on, and I refused to let him just roll me in the argument that ensued.” At this point, Anders’s attempt to feign nonchalance about the whole thing crumbles, and he takes a deep swig from the bottle itself. “Seems that I can either have him, or my pride, and not both. While there may not be much of a future in the whole ‘Renegade Mage’ profession, I’m not sure I’m ready to switch careers to 'catamite.’”

Varric tries to ignore Isabela between them as she just smiles. Mmm, catamite. “You know, Blondie… I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but did you not notice him going on about mages this entire time? I would assume everything would be the same, only now you have an /excellent/ way to make up.”

“He should make up. I can’t let him just beat me down and then go crawling back every single time. 'Oh Fenris, I’m so sorry I stood up for myself.’ I think you know how pathetic that would be.”

Isabela takes a swig from her mug. “Then why don’t you tell him to?”

“He already told me to fuck off once, I don’t want to hear it from him again today.” Anders takes another drink and turns to lean on the bar, beginning to feel blurred and uncomfortably warm. “I thought… we were starting to understand each other.”

“Oh fuck him, I’m sure you can make him say he’s sorry. Very sorry.” She’ll write about it either way.

Varric tsks. “Ignore the whore, she hasn’t gotten any lately. Have you ever seen him hurt from a fight over mages, Blondie? Who says you gotta back down, just let him wear himself out.”

Anders glances sidelong at Isabela. “You’re right, Varric, but… I have to admit I kind of like Isabela’s idea. Maker, he’s so… infuriating, for somebody who has an ass like polished granite and a face that would make Andraste feel plain.” Anders takes another drink. “Maybe he’s worth being a bit pathetic for.”

Isabela murmurs, “You know I’m going to tell him about that granite ass observation next I see him.”

“You know, he likes you too. I daresay he wants this to work just as much as you do.”

“He… said so.” Anders sighs, as he feels the last of his resolve crumble away. “You’re right, -as usual.- I need to see him. I need to tell him it’s alright.” he leaves the bottle on the counter as he pushes away from it. “Finish it off for me if you would. Consider it a thank-you.”

“Say hello to the porcupine for me!” Varric pulls over the bottle for him and Isabela, noting the label as he pours them fresh drinks. There’ll just be a fresh bottle at the clinic waiting. Blondie deserves it, putting up with this.

—-

 

At the mansion there’s a fresh welcome mat of broken glass amongst the general disarray of things, the remains of the empty bottle crunchy underfoot. Judging from the wide spray it came flying through the main hall at some point during the night, and it practically makes an arrow towards the bedroom’s open door.  
The fire has died down but the elf hasn’t bothered tending to it. Fenris is sitting at the small table, one elbow out to prop him up while the other tips the bottle of wine he’s suckling from. 

The door slams open, and Anders storms through, kicking it shut again and pausing only a moment to make sure it latches. He crunches over broken glass on his way up the stairs and storms through the doorway, his eyes fixed on Fenris, his head lowered as he reaches out to push the bottle of wine in Fenris’s hand out of his way. “I’m still keeping you. And I’m sorry.”

Fenris had heard the noise from Anders all the way until he got here. The elf would’ve leapt up assuming the worst, if he’d cared. Instead he just watches Anders warily, even as the bottle is pulled from his lips without a struggle. “Why?”

Anders was getting ready for a truly voracious kiss, but seeing Fenris this morose brings him up short. He crouches down at Fenris’s feet, arms resting loosely on his knees as he looks up at the elf. “Because I hate thinking of you being in pain. Because I hate thinking of you being alone. Because I regret that some of what I said was cruel.”

Fenris doesn’t answer for an almost uncomfortable amount of seconds, nothing but the choking fire cracking and popping at the silence. “Sometimes… I can’t tell if everyone is blind or I’m just going mad.” The words are half statement, half pleading for an answer either way.

Anders shakes his head, reaching up, tentative, to rest his hands on Fenris’s hands. “You’re not going mad. I think sometimes you let your anger make your choices for you, but you aren’t …mad… and Maker knows I can be just as bad.” There’s too much sorrow and uncertainty in Fenris’s eyes, and Anders’s expression floods with sympathy. 

Fenris’ hands flinch, but decidedly remain upon realizing that there’s a safe barrier of a gauntlet metal between their skin. “Don’t look at me like that. I don’t want your pity.” His hands slip past Anders’ touch to cup the corners of his jaw. “You’re the only one I trust. You’re far from bad.” Fenris leans in as he gently lifts the mage’s chin, and presses their lips together.

Anders exhales, pressing back against Fenris’s lips, warm and eager. “I love you.” Anders breaks the kiss just long enough to whisper that, his lips against Fenris’s again a heartbeat later. “I want you.” He breaks the kiss again, just as briefly, a deliberate tease before he sinks his tongue into Fenris’s mouth.

Fenris’ best response to that is a quietly hummed groan and a minute nod that’s careful not to break the kiss. His lips part readily, his own tongue finding the mage’s with a renewed spark of interest. The touch along Anders’ cheeks brush down to his jacket, gauntlets digging into the front and gathering the thicker clothes tightly, and with little effort he hauls them both to stand up. From what he’s paid attention to before this just seems like the easiest position to strip the man, and after unsnapping and dropping his gauntlets with a small hailstorm of noise onto the tile he reaches forward to undo the jacket and slide it off.

Fenris is right. Anders wears too many clothes. He thinks about taking some shortcuts, but Fenris is already unfastening his jacket. He moves at Fenris’s bidding, just helping Fenris strip him, his eyes on Fenris’s face the entire time. Normally he would be worried about putting forth his fair share of effort, but so far it’s seemed that it’s easier for Fenris when he’s more passive. Maybe some of those walls in him will crumble, if Anders just… trusts him. Lets him lead. With the flush in his cheeks and lips, and the growing bulge in his pants, at least there’s no mistaking him for disinterested.

The urgency of Fenris’ movements rises the longer it takes him to work off every belt, button and article of clothing. He curses at it silently, mild frustration evident in his eyes as he looks down to work it all free. With the final well worn shirt pulled up and off the elf takes a moment to lean his body against the other, now topless man. He reaches to his side to undo the straps of his remaining armor as he trails a few lingering kisses along Anders’ neck, the metal cold between them, and grinds his own trapped erection forward.

Anders puts his arms around Fenris to press him close. The cold metal makes him flinch at first, but he ignores it, lips brushing along Fenris’s ear, while with one foot he kicks his coat aside. While Fenris works at the buckles of his armor, Anders pushes his own pants past his hips and kicks them away as well. He turns his gaze on Fenris, looking his body over hungrily. Isabela’s right, he resolves. They really ought to be spending more time doing this.

The unwelcome armor doesn’t last as Fenris loosens the last buckle, pulls it from them and drops it out of the way, the sound from it clanging against the tile almost making him jump. The thick leather of his belt is pulled free, it’s sound far less intrusive, and he finds the last real barrier in the toggles of his shirt. He mutters a curse about it, but for all that he hates the delay he can’t see himself damaging it or wearing anything else. The vest slowly cracks and bares his collarbone, and he comes to the conclusion that this would go just as fast one-handed as he runs his free hand between them to grip Anders’ arousal.

Anders groans and gives a slow thrust into Fenris’s hand, reaching down to cup him through his pants. His thumb drags along Fenris’s trapped erection, tracing its shaft, and his mouth is drawn to that patch of bare throat. He can feel the lines in Fenris’s skin, not tactile but almost like a whisper, a hum that comes softly alive between them.

Fenris’ breathing hitches at the touch, and pointedly draws his chin out of the way to provide Anders better access to his more vulnerable skin. The feeling of the warm lips presses against him and spiderwebs a very faint tingle along his scars, the effect cascading into a shiver that makes his erection twitch with want in Anders’ hand, tight in it’s confines. He reluctantly abandons the mage’s dick to pull out of his top and finally finds the edges of his pants, thumbs sliding along the edge across his hips before hooking under it and shoving it down out of the way to free himself.

Anders reluctantly lets his hands fall to his sides, Fenris’s nudity seeming to him to be the most vicious tease ever devised. He wants to run his hands over those smooth, lean flanks, and grip and knead the unbearably perfect ass he’d only just been raving about. His cock throbs and twtiches, brushing against Fenris’s freed erection, and he groans against Fenris’s neck.

Fenris seems willing to at least try making enough touch for the both of them. His hands rise to slip under Anders’ arms and his palms press against his chest, then turn and grind downward until they come to a firm rest at the mage’s hips. The grip tightens to pull them together, and Fenris glances over his shoulder before he nuzzles against Anders’ hair, and pulls them back to the bed until they practically fall back onto it.

Anders stumbles a bit against the bed and climbs up onto it, poised over Fenris to maul him with kisses, lips and teeth grazing their way across his chest and belly. With one hand he pulls the tie out of his hair and lets the ends drag over Fenris’s skin.He trails kisses further down, following the curving path of one of his marks to the hinge of his thigh.

Fenris’ legs part to either side of Anders’ hips unconsciously as they land against each other. He shoves his elbows under to prop himself up, an edge disappointed as those warm lips fall out of reach from his own, though it’s not enough to complain about when the kisses to his skin makes his erection throb and press desperately against the other man’s chest. By the time the mage’s mouth has made it’s way to his hip, a few drops of precum have formed at the tip and threaten to drip onto the elf’s stomach. “Wait-” The word comes out as a bit of a surprise as he pauses, a bit more heat finding his cheeks as he forces himself to finish the thought. “…I’d rather have you.”

Anders raises his head just as his lips brush against the base of Fenris’s shaft. That invitation, that -blush-… for a moment he feels the impish temptation to try and make Fenris tell him just how much he wants to be taken. “Let me make you ready,” he says softly, shifting further onto the bed to give them both room to get comfortable.

 

Fenris sinks back against the bed and watches Anders almost warily, but it breaks on those words for faintly embarrassed irritation. “I already said I was. I don’t intend to repeat the obvious for you.” Though his experience might feel limited it already seems far more complicated, being with another man. It’s a wonder they get anything done.

Anders leans over Fenris and gives him a quick kiss. “You’re not. We went too fast last time and it hurt you more than it should. Let me do you properly. This isn’t a chore, I promise.” Anders begins to smile as he sits up, reaching for the small canister he’d left by the bedside. “You blush beautifully, love.”

“It was fine, I..” He trails off, not bothering to finish the sentence since it doesn’t seem to be convincing Anders of anything. For a moment he seems curiously interested, enough to start sitting up a bit to see what could possibly be over there to help this. The compliment just makes Fenris turn his head away, his hair only partially working to his advantage as his blush gets worse. "Just get on with it.“

"I’m going to need to ask Isabela to teach you a thing or two about pillow talk,” Anders teases. He unscrews the lid of the canister and sets it asside. The short, wide-mouthed jar is full of some kind of clear jelly, with a very faint, sweet smell. Anders takes advantage of the screen of Fenris’s hair to duck in and kiss the corner of his jaw. “Lie back. I need to have my hands on you for this, so tell me when it becomes too much and I’ll stop.”

“If you want her ‘charm’, you should probably leave now.” Personally he can’t stand her brand of sweet nothings. Any further thoughts stop as Fenris snaps his head back towards Anders for the last comment and gives him a long, hard look, debating it thoroughly before he finally complies uneasily. “I suppose saying stop while we’re ahead is out of the question.”

Anders settles on his knees, nudging Fenris’s legs apart. He begins to kiss his way along Fenris’s lean thigh, shifting to settle on his belly. “Maybe I should start with something that will make you think twice about scolding me during sex,” he says dryly. And then he hitches Fenris’s legs over his shoulders and ducks his head down, his lips and tongue warm and wet against the vulnerable pucker of Fenris’s ass.

“I wasn’t-” Fenris sucks in a small breath through his teeth, any protest he was about to say entirely forgotten. The bud tightens at the wet touch it’s completely unused to, but his cock throbs hotly in interest. Still, this can’t be called relaxing, and Fenris reaches down to circle his hand around his erection, very slowly massages his shaft to coax his mind from panicking just yet.

Anders deepens that kiss, his tongue swirling around Fenris’s tender ass and pressing in, just barely entering. He lifts his head at last, panting, his fingers bringing a scoop of slick jelly to where his mouth just was, and after giving Fenris’s anus a liberal smear of lube, his fingertips begin to tease their way into him. Anders keeps his eyes on Fenris’s face, watching to be sure the balance stays tipped more towards pleasure than fear.

Fenris’s lips crack with moist air as his breathing gets heavier, ragged, and it goes quiet as Anders’ fingers part him. The small panic he was facing down strikes immediately, subsides with the pleasure, only to linger uncomfortably. The ring of muscle shudders around Anders’ touch, actively on the uneasy line between relaxing and fighting against it.

Anders takes his time, working his fingers in bit by bit,twisting them inside Fenris and crooking gently towards that spot inside him. He pulls his fingers out for a biref moment, only to gather another scoop of lube and begin to work it into Fenris, making his entrance slick and supple. His own cock flexes, kissing his belly with a dab of precum, his patience ticking away until he finally decides it’s enough. His fingers pull free, and he strokes his own shaft until it glistens with lubrication.

Fenris finally drops his head back for a few moments, and finds himself finally starting to dig against the feeling of Anders’ fingers working on him. It wavers over a mix of beautiful and torturous, but most of all is frustratingly unsatisfying. His eyes flicker open and back down as Anders pulls away, somewhat still awaiting the same amount of pain as before but at the same time not particularly caring. So he watches the mage expectantly, lightly panting and naked against the bed with his hand firmly stroking his dripping erection, and his cheeks threaten to flush from how he must look at this point.

From the look on Anders’s face as he shifts into position, Fenris could guess at the tempting mixture of erotic and simply beautiful that Anders sees in him. His eyes follow the lyrium lines on his torso, pausing at the dripping tip of his cock, fixing on the sigh of Fenris’s hand around his own shaft until his cock twitches with sympathy. He reaches down between them and fits his tip to Fenris’s entrance and begins to push forward. Penetration isn’t easy, exactly, with Fenris’s body still almost virginally tight, but it’s smoother by far, Anders’s cock popping past that tight ring of muscle and then burying itself inside him. Anders bites his lip hard, panting for breath and fighting to hold his calm.

Fenris arches his back to help Anders force himself in, gasping for air as his insides have moments of flexing tightly around Anders’ cock, the pleasure harsh but worth it as he feels every inch of the shaft stretching him. Beyond the feeling that his insides are being tested at their limits, the lube makes it so much more accomodating and he shifts his hips to grind their hips closer. The soft lean at his prostate from the movement already teases him, and he tries hopelessly to shift and favor a side to get the best angle.

Anders does what he can to help, pulling his hips back a bit as Fenris adjusts, and then plunging back in, fitting his hips tight to Fenris’s haunches. He hugs Fenris’s leg against his chest, helping him rest the crook of his knee on his shoulder. With his free hand he presses down on the base of his shaft, helping himself find just the right angle to grind in against that firm place inside Fenris as the first rolling thrusts make him groan. His toes curl against the sheets and Anders bucks his hips up against Fenris hard enough to jostle them both, his body impatient for a quicker, rougher rhythm.

Fenris drops one leg and settles along his side, propping his elbows against the bed as he looks back at the halting fucking. His jaw hangs open with a small silent intake of air with each time Anders sinks into him, the movement startlingly tight but not screaming with the friction like it had before. He abandons his hot shaft as this already feels ready to end him at the earliest excuse, and tips his head up to find Anders’ gaze.

Anders looks back at Fenris with half-focused eyes, pupils wide and dark. The flush of sex is vivid under his fair skin, shades of rose fading to ivory on his chest. He moans as he finds his rhythm, his hips rolling steadily against Fenris and pausing minutely every few thrusts, his tip nuzzling, grinding up against his spot before he thrusts again. His balls tighten against the base of his shaft, throbbing until they ache, but each time the crest of his climax seems too close, Anders pauses, breathes, forces himself back from the precipice. They spent enough time getting ready that he has even more reason to want to make this last.

The head of Fenris’ cock flushes darker, the battered and massaged place deep inside him sending rewarding waves through his hips. His erection bobs from it’s own accord as much as from the weighty force of their sex rocking Fenris’ hips. The gaze he’d locked onto the mage falls away as he closes his eyes with a surprised drawn out moan, momentarily sincere in how loud and utterly pleading it is until Fenris snaps his mouth shut.

“Let me hear it!” Anders calls our hoarsely, the words breaking off for him to moan. “Please… Fenris, /please/!” He can feel tears at the corners of his eyes, desperate pleasure forming a tight coil deep at the core of him that he tries to soothe and tame. He reaches down, fingers digging into the soft underbelly of his cock and he holds himself shut, brutally choking back on his pleasure.

Fenris forces his eyes back open to glance up in his hesitation, then drops his head away as he lets his moans past his clenched teeth. The sounds shudder the more uneven and heavy his breathing becomes, then louder before cutting off sharply. With what feels like every muscle straining for his release he holds his breath for a couple moments, putting pressure against the intense tightness building until it overwhelms him. His body spasms once, roughly, with his orgasm and he deliberately sighs before his instincts take over. It racks his lungs to gasp for air as his dick spills his seed in passionate, long spurts.

Anders yells out in climax, nearly loud enough to shake dust from the rafters. His hips buck hard into Fenris, a flurry of thrusts ending in one hard push as his cream pours out in a pulsing flood, adding to the wetness already inside Fenris. Pleasure wracks Anders so mercilessly he almost sobs, his cries turning raw and desperate and finally breaking in a gasp for air. Beads of sweat stand out on gorgeously flushed skin, darken the roots of his hair and make it cling in wisps to the sides of his face. He pulls his still-twitching cock free of Fenris with a careful tug and gives in to gravity, collapsing beside his lover and panting for breath, moaning with the aftershocks.

Fenris was about to try dragging Anders down anyway so when the man falls he coughs a small, silent chuckle. With the last of his energy he rolls over and props himself up over the mage, and finds his lips in a tired hunger. Something about muffling those small sounds with his gratitude is pleasing.

Anders makes plenty of little, sweet noises for Fenris’s kisses to drown. Heedless of anything for a few moments, he raises his hands to run his fingers through Fenris’s silky hair, then lets them fall to the bed again. He rubs a couple of unshed tears of pleasure from his eyes and gives Fenris a small, stunned smile. “That settles it… definitely the best I have ever had.”

Fenris flinches from the touch ever so faintly, too tired to make an attempt at fighting it before the caress retreats on it’s own. With his energy to even hold himself up waning he crashes back against the bed at the mage’s side, and takes a moment to close his eyes. “You’re flattering me again, or you had a profound number of terrible partners.”

“Some were pretty lackluster. And none of them ever made me come so hard I thought my dick would turn inside out. Which now that I say it out loud is a terrible image. Maker, you’re gorgeous…” Anders turns his head, looking down the length of Fenris’s body, every thought that wanders through his dazed head slipping out of his mouth as if he were drunk. “It didn’t hurt as much this time, did it? I know it’s frustrating but a little time up front is worth it…”

Fenris shakes his head and drops a hand to the bridge of his nose. “Stop saying that, I’m no more than you are..” Of course at that admission he’s quick to try to change the subject before he dies of self conscious embarrassment. “You’ve done so much for me. Is there anything /you/ want?”

Anders’s sex-dazed expression shows distinct shades of affectionate contentment at Fenris’s grumpy-yet-sweet praise. “A couple of things,” Anders says, his voice at its most gentle. “I want to touch you without making you flinch. And I want you to… talk to me. Tell me what you like. For all that we’ve managed to have some frankly incredible sex, I’m still… honestly terrified of fucking up. Tell me what you like, and be shameless about it. I want to know what I can do to please you… I want to do everything I can, everything you’ve ever craved.”

Fenris pauses in as serious thought as he can muster. “I… never really thought about it before. I didn’t have time or reason to. But both of those are about me, again.”

Anders thinks about that and realizes it’s true. A sure sign how stuck on Fenris he is. “There’s something else, but… you’re going to need to forgive me in advance.” There’s a bit of a renewed blush in Anders’s cheeks.

“You can’t tell me to be shameless and follow it with a warning, Anders.”

Anders swallows, then manages, with effort, to look Fenris in the eyes. “…Say my name again.”  
“That’s what I want/. I want you to say my name. I want you to say…” Ander swallows again, fighting a knot in his throat, “…that you love me. If… if you do. If you don’t, well… we can just… go on having incredibly good sex, I suppose, and that’s… I wouldn’t turn that down. Sometimes… I do need you to state the obvious.” He bits the inner surface of his lower lip to stop a quiver in his chin, and turns his face away, feeling remarkably pathetic.

“You’re that worried?” Fenris props himself up onto an elbow. “Mage, we’ve done far more than I have with anyone else. I /want/ you to touch me. You’re… you’ve done more for me than I thought anyone would care enough to. We don’t agree about anything but I want to be with you every moment I can.” He leans in, lips nearly pressing against the other man’s ear. “Tell me what you think that means, Anders.”

“Please just say it,” Anders whispers, his cheek and chin rubbing against Fenris in a bristly nuzzle. “I believe it already I just… want to hear you say it’s true. I’ve never had this. No one’s said those words to me since I was a child.”

Fenris sighs faintly, presses his lips against Anders’ earlobe a moment. “Ardor meus, amor meus, vita mea. Nothing you could do would push me away now.”

Anders draws a shuddering breath, arms wrapping tight around Fenris. His answer is a shaking whisper. “Beloved… you are life itself to me.” He shuts his eyes upon fresh tears. “Thank you…” The words sink deeply into him, the words and the sound of Fenris’s voice, an indelible stamp on his soul.

Fenris raises his head a few inches to brush their lips together, a short and gentle gesture before he quietly adds, “Is that really all you wanted, or was I this much of a distraction just mentioning your name?”

“I don’t know about all I wanted, but… I wanted this.” Anders leans in for a second soft kiss. “I’m a complete sap, I admit it. If you’re feeling exceptionally generous, I accept blowjobs, handjobs, flattery, and you still being here beside me when I wake up.” His smile is tender and contentedly happy as he lays back, hands under his head. “Oh, by the way, I’m moving in if you don’t object.”

“How.. /kind/ of you to notify me.” While the idea sparks the back of his mind that he won’t be able to have time alone, he realizes saying no would break him without the mage having to lift a finger of input. “I suppose I should also point out that people don’t eat strays here.” He has a feeling he’ll regret this. Really. But it may be worth it to see Anders’ reaction.

Anders blinks, not entirely daring to hope just yet. “Stray cats, you mean? Are you saying it’s alright if I keep one here? I’ll change the sandbox and everything myself, of course.” Anders sits up in bed, loosely hugging his knees. His eyes wide, he begins to give a pleading pout. “I won’t give it an especially embarrassing name or anything, please say yes…”

Fenris drops onto his back, waves a hand to the rest of the mansion. “Yes. Do anything you want, I only use three rooms here.”

Anders throws his arms in the air with a joyous whoop, flopping back and bouncing on the bed. “A kitty of our very own! I promise you won’t regret this.”


	11. Chapter 11

Now that Anders has settled into the derelict mansion, the study is in use again and has a bit more clutter. But a number of other rooms, most notably the main atrium, are missing things. Most conspicuous is the sudden absence of dessicated corpses and indoor mushrooms. And on second glance there is also a disconcerting lack of cobwebs and dust. The floors are swept, and Anders is on his hands and knees, scrubbing away old stains of blood and wine.

 

The study was quite fair enough, if only because it had a desk to coalesce what Fenris silently termed as Anders’ ‘nonsense’. It was a fair enough title, seeing as he couldn’t read any of it and didn’t intend on asking what magic the man was studying. It would likely just piss him off.  
And now in the main hall Fenris is at the top of the stairs in front of the bedroom, watching with an air of disapproval like a vulture getting it’s dead scraggly tree being taken away.  
“It looks… nice.” Funny, how 'nice’ sounds more like 'absolutely atrocious’ the way he tones it.

Anders looks up from his scrubbing and rubs the back of his arm across his forehead. "It does, doesn’t it?“ He seems blithely unaware of Fenris’s tone as he smiles up at the elf; it could be he didn’t take notice, but it’s just as likely he’s deliberately ignoring it. "I’m going to start replacing the loose tiles once I’ve got out all the stains. Should be quite snappy, as bare empty rooms go. I wonder where a man can go to find a couch on the cheap in this city.”

Fenris props his elbows along the stone railing, only making previous perched comparison all the more apt. “I haven’t the slightest. Are you going to add an altar to the Imperium while you’re at it?”

Anders looks up at Fenris and scratches his head, baffled. "I wasn’t planning on it. Just… a nice couch? Do you not like couches? I just thought it would be good for… sitting on. Together.“

Fenris grumbles under his breath. He can’t deny couches for sitting on together. "It’s not that. The rest of it.” He waves a hand across the room, and it’s general.. cleanliness. Lack of bodies.

Anders looks around the room, utterly uncomprehending. "I admit it’s a bit gloomy, but I think getting rid of the cobwebs and mushrooms helped a bit. Look, predilections for dick notwithstanding, I don’t have any real talent for decorating. If you have a problem with the color of the drapes, you’ll have to spell it out for me.“

Fenris looks up across the large space, trying to cool his temper. It’s vaguely easier when Anders just seems so confused, instead of understanding and blowing it off. Though there’s still time for that last one. "A Tevinter merchant still owns this place. I was hoping to leave it /rotting/ if he ever returned to reclaim it.”

“I was hoping to make him piss himself and send him running off into the night, personally. This is -your- house.”

Fenris props his chin against one hand. Nobody’s ever considered this place his before, not even himself. Least of all himself, most likely. “You think so? The law seems to say otherwise.”

“Possession is nine tenths of the law. For all either of us know, this merchant is dead. Even if he’s not I’d put even money on you being able to beat the shit out of him and his entourage. And you’re also friends with the captain of the guard and the bloody Champion of Kirkwall. You can have this place deeded to you anytime you like, under any false name you care to invent. All you need to do is ask.”

Fenris can’t help but smirk at that. “And then I would be the only elf in Hightown, living in a mansion with barely five sovereign to my name.” Before he could just lurk around at night, and nobody would have to know who actually lived in the run down mansion at the end of the small entryway that kept the door off of the main walk. “I don’t belong here, they would assume it’s and I’m yours.”

“They? I don’t think either of us are planning to make a debut in high society. Let them think what they want, I’m not inviting 'them’ into your parlor if you aren’t.” Anders leaves his brush and bucket and climbs the stairs to Fenris’s side. "I don’t really belong here, either. And I don’t mean to sound insistent. It’s just something that occurred to me. All of this is your choice and I’m content with that.“

Fenris watches Anders approach, and glances back out over the mansion looking vaguely sortof beginnings of decent as he sighs."You’re right. I shouldn’t care. I don’t. It’s… this doesn’t feel right. I don’t deserve this. Freedom is so alien I don’t know what to do anymore.”

Anders leans in, ducking his chin down to find Fenris’s lips. "Never mind it for now.“ He leans his forehead lightly against Fenris’s brow.

Fenris turns his head the couple inches it takes to meet their lips lightly, and still watches the mansion like it’ll try to swallow him up the moment it looks clean. "And what should I be thinking about instead? I can’t /just/ think about you, mage, as much as you’d like it.”

Anders looks at Fenris assessingly and begins to realize he’s fairly committed to being bothered about all this. Another time it might have annoyed him, but today he feels sympathetic, and a bit disappointed since he’d hoped Fenris would be pleased with all the work he’d done. "There’s a pot of oat porridge in the kitchen. You can think about that, if you’re hungry. But I should warn you, I cleaned that up as well.“ His elbows planted on the railing, he drops his head into his upturned palms.

As soon as the word mage just rolls off Fenris’ tongue he partially regrets it. The black tar Tevinter left with him is almost palpable, boiling to the surface and lashing out at anyone within range. Anders is the last person he should be angry at for any of this. "I’m sorry, that was unwarranted. I should be thanking you.”

Anders lifts his head, then shakes it. "No need to apologize. I should’ve given some thought…. I don’t know what it’s like for you, adjusting to life here, or what your thoughts are about making a home. I’ve never asked, and when the others mention it you kind of… evade. That should have told me something.“ He straightens up and stretches, arms above his head, until his spine pops. "Maybe it is time to think about what you want.”

“What am I supposed to want?! If I’m evading it isn’t without reason.” Fenris shoves away from the stone railing as his frustration burns at nothing in particular, and he starts to pace. “Danarius tells me what to do, the fog warriors until I killed them for not ordering me, the slavers dictated where I ran and now I follow Hawke. It’s all the same isn’t it, just with a kinder master! And now I’m left with nothing and I’m lost without them. The Qun is right, nothing changes in my role no matter how much I struggle.” He stops, realizing he’s dove into his own personal mire. “I.. do you want to live here?”

Anders listens, quiet and sympathetic, and smiles slightly at the final question. "I want to live with you. It could be here or lowtown or a log cabin in the Anderfels for all I care, as long as you’re there. But… if you don’t hate it here, this is as good a place as we’re likely to find in Kirkwall. A roof over our heads, a warm hearth, card games once a week and a cellar full of wine.“

Fenris sighs at that, the energy of his small break escaping with it entirely. He nods, tired and looking a bit defeated. "I’ll look into the paperwork tomorrow. And I’m surprised you’ve managed to do this much without running out to find yourself a cat.” Though with the size of this mansion, for all he knows the mage has already brought in five.

Anders looks puzzled and a bit concerned with that defeated look. But he wonders if it’s something to pursue further just now. "You have much to learn of the Way of the Cat, my love. A man does not find his cat. His cat finds him,“ Anders intones with dramatized sagaciousness and steepled fingers. "Patience is key. A cat cannot be taken, merely courted.”

Fenris waves a hand for Anders to follow him down the steps, because somewhere back there he remembers someone saying something about food idling in the kitchen. “Then this is a habit of yours, patiently courting things.”

“Some things are worth waiting for,” Anders answers, following Fenris down the steps and into the kitchen. Most of the bowls and plates are chipped, and a number of the wooden trenchers had to be thrown away entirely due to mold and rot, but there are still plenty of dishes for the two of them. “The porridge is a bit sweet. I found brown sugar in the pantry but it was a solid brick, so I chipped off half and threw it in.” There’s a pitcher of cold water by the pump, and Anders fills a pair of tin mugs with it, passing one to Fenris as he sits down. “Andraste’s knicker-weasels, didn’t take me long to get domestic.”

“I wasn’t going to say it.” If only because a part of him wouldn’t mind having steady meals for once, that didn’t consist of the minefield that is the Hanged Man’s fare. So even when the food does turn out sweet, he’s not exactly complaining. “Careful. You’ll get pregnant with triplets at this rate, and I don’t think we’re ready for a family while we’re following Hawke.”

“I’ll train them to bite and turn them loose on the Templars.” Anders smiles at the thought. “This… I just wonder if it’s something I’ve wanted for a long time and never admitted to myself. Right now, it feels so much like 'playing house.’ Then I think to myself whether or not it will last and I don’t know what to think. I do know, I’m going to need to find a way to earn some coin, if I’m going to be able to put food on the table for you and the triplets.” Anders grins, laughing inwardly.

“Then maybe you should stop playing diamondback, at this rate.” Fenris pauses their joking though, glancing up toward the study for a split second as if he could see through walls, before his gaze falls back to Anders. “What are you going to do about the clinic?”

Anders meets Fenris’s gaze, sobering. “I’m taking a short break. After a couple of nights ago I thought it would be for the best to acknowledge that my life has changed, and to figure out what happens next. And… I wanted some time for purely selfish reasons,” he admits with a half-smile. “I’ll go back to it. It’s the best thing I can think of to do with my abilities. I’ll just need to find a few good bolt-holes between here and Darktown to make it work.”

“Good.” Fenris finishes the last of his food, washing it down with the water and thinking it a bit strange after he’s lived off of various alcohols since he got here. “I don’t want to get between you and your precious 'being a good person’.”

“And here I thought you’d rail at me if I let my benevolence start to slip.” Anders leans one elbow on the table. “It did occur to me to make your sexual gratification my new mission in life, though. If that appeals to you I could probably be persuaded…”

“Funny. I was under the impression that was already your new mission in life.” Fenris actually manages to take his bowl and glass to the sink, making a small effort to keep Anders’ work from being turned into a mess again so quickly. Small steps.  
He turns back to sit at the mage’s side, back to the tabletop. “What would be different?”

“I’d wear scantier clothing and spend my free time abandoning my sense of shame? Actually, that’s a good question.” Anders looks sheepish.


	12. Chapter 12

When Anders returns there’s voices from farther inside the mansion. Fenris has dragged a small folding table from the kitchen into the foyer, a real mark that the mansion is sorely needing furniture from how cowed the tiny wooden piece is when bared alone to the vast empty space.

 

He and Aveline are beside each other, the elf’s palms propped against the wooden edge with a pen between two fingers, while she reads aloud what sounds like contract paperwork. Fenris looks.. frustrated, but too distracted paying attention to act upon it. Papers are flooded over the table, covering it’s space and crowding as they overlap each other, with more in Aveline’s hand. Turns out launching a claim of ownership, even if slid through the approval process by certain people, involves more than a quick sign on the dotted line. Delayed even further by the fact that Fenris isn’t just skimming the legalese, and Aveline is reading it out. Pointedly, her words clear and not sped over like some formality.

Anders kicks the door shut, nearly staggering under the encumbrance of the crates and rucksacks of goods he’s returning with. To add to the absurdity he has a brace of plucked hens hanging from a cord he holds in his teeth. “HERRO AV'REEN, HERRO RUV!!” Anders makes his way through the main foyer as quickly as he can, and there’s a series of thuds from the kitchen as his entire load is abruptly and roughly set down. A few moments later and he returns, coat shed and a grin on his face. "I went to Lirene’s for a sack of flour,“ he says by way of a terse explanation.

Aveline goes silent, simply trying not to laugh as Anders passes them by to the kitchen. "Is he always like this?”  
“Always, I’m afraid.”  
She just smiles as the mage returns, so starkly contrasted by Fenris’ usual look of quiet tolerance towards things like ‘being adorable’. “And what are you going to make with all of that flour?”  
Fenris just looks irritated at her obvious attempt to draw out the cute domestication, and looks back down to the paperwork. More so that he’s back already, the elf had hoped this would be over well before Anders came to interrupt it. “Ignore him.”  
“Alright, alright, spoilsport..” Aveline turns her attention back down, finding her place again and starts reading.

“Pie,” Anders answers decisively. "And the occasional pancake. But then some of the refugees heard I had a pantry to stock and they just kept -giving- me things.“  
Anders steps up beside Fenris and looks down at all the papers spread out in front of them. And discovers that all of them are turned upright in respect to Aveline, not Fenris. "Wouldn’t it be more convenient if you just came by and picked these up tomorrow?”

Aveline looks back up in surprise, then turns with an immediate change in expression to mildly accusatory. “He doesn’t know?”  
Fenris tips his head upward, but doesn’t look up from the paperwork in hopes that they can just… continue. “No. I would like to keep it that way.”  
“Fenris, this is important. He seems to have a knack for helping you..” She waves a hand across the cleaner mansion.  
“Noted. Can we get on with it?”

There’s a cold and queasy feeling that comes with the realization that things might not be quite what you thought they were. Anders feels that sinking in his gut. “Doesn’t know what? What don’t I know?” Fenris brushing aside Aveline’s insistence rouses even more uneasy suspicion. What would Fenris be hiding from him?

“It’s nothing.”  
“You know, now that you mention it, I think it’s a /wonderful/ idea.” Aveline sets down the rest of the pile she has in hand, a bit smug at her idea despite the fact that Fenris is glaring daggers enough that she might find herself dead by next morning. “I’ll be by for these tomorrow afternoon. With any luck, they’ll be signed.”  
“Aveline…” Her name is grated in his voice. Oh, he knows exactly what she’s doing and hates her for it.  
“No. You know I have things I should be doing, and you’ll thank me later. Maybe.” She gives a small wave to Anders, and turns to go. “Good luck!”

“Er, thank you.” Anders is perplexed, but under that perplexity there are clear shades of irritation. When the door shuts, he turns to Fenris with his head tilted, his eyes narrowing. “For somebody who tells me he would never push me away, you spend a lot of time holding me at arms’ length. Whatever this is about, you can tell me when you’re ready.” He turns and strides back into the kitchen. He’s got things to put away, after all.

Fenris lets Anders leave without protest, and behind him the elf slams his fist against the table before storming off on his own. It takes some time for him to convince himself, somewhere on the opposite end of the mansion, that Aveline isn’t just going to magically appear and Anders will vanish and they can just continue along as they had. It was hard enough telling her, but then things seemed more matter of fact and not something to be self conscious about, with her. With Anders, everything was always different.  
So it takes some time, but eventually Fenris stalks back to the kitchen, and props his back against the doorway silently. Well, it’s a start.

By the time Fenris returns to the kitchen, there are smells. Good smells. Savory, succulent smells. A whole chicken roasting in the oven with wedges of onion, cloves of garlic and a liberal sprinkle of rosemary. Bread rising on the hearth, a bubbling pot on the fire full of cooking cabbage and barley. And Anders, wearing a dusting of flour on his tunic and his hands, is rolling out a pie crust, true to his word. He looks up as Fenris leans in the doorway, and he smiles, having worked away his irritation some time ago. “I hope you brought your appetite, love.”

Fenris’ determined mood pauses a moment as he glances over everything. There is 'more than I deserve’, and then there’s this. Maybe the man was the cook for the entire circle. He just can’t imagine this being a hobby. But through all of his questions, his own pointed reason for coming here forgotten for a split second, and the only one that comes out is, “How were you still alone?”

That does catch Anders by surprise. “Because I hadn’t met you yet.” He could swear he’d been about to remind Fenris about the whole Abomination thing, the poverty, the taint, the being hounded by templars. But that came out instead, and Anders is content with it. He sets down an earthenware goblet and pours Fenris some wine from an open bottle.

Fenris tries not to look so disgusted at that response, and as soon as Anders finishes pouring the wine he reaches out to pick up the bottle. Good, he won’t have to worry about passing it back and sharing. “Good to know that you could just /feed/ the darkspawn to death.” For a moment, he debates just letting the issue hanging over him slide unsaid, he would sign the papers and be done with it. Aveline would assume the issue is over if they were, and he’d be able to continue as if nothing had happened.

“Cooking is wasted on darkspawn. They’ll eat anything.” Anders tsks quietly as Fenris just swipes the bottle, and he takes a chug from the goblet himself. “It just occurred to me the other day that I hadn’t had a pie in six years. /Six years!/ That is no way for a man to live!” Anders brings a floury fist down in his palm, then sits down on the bench at the kitchen table, straddling it to face Fenris. “Have you got something to tell me?”

Right. Of course, just forgetting in the name of pie would have been too easy. Fenris tips the bottle and takes several large gulps from it, drastic even for him, only coming up for air once he feels the burn hit. He looks away as he sets down the bottle on the countertop. “Slaves aren’t permitted to read in Tevinter. I never learned.”

It’s so far from anything Anders had expected that it takes him a while to actually parse Fenris’s words. "From the way you acted I was expecting you to be hiding a brood of illegitimate children. You just… don’t know how to read? I’ll teach you.“ He shrugs his shoulders and swings his leg back over the bench, standing up and returning to his piecrust. "You’re going -love- Varric’s serials. You’re in for a treat, I promise you that.”

Fenris raises a hand to tap a few fingers along the bridge of his nose. “Children would have been easier, I think. And unless Isabela’s hiding something, I don’t have any.” His hand drops away while his head falls back with a light thud against the doorframe. “Don’t you think it’s a bit late?”

Anders begins laying the piecrust into a tin and turns his head. “Not really. You’re clever and I think you’ll manage just fine.” It becomes clear how much anxiety Fenris has over this. Anders walks away from his cooking for a moment to kiss Fenris on the shoulder, giving him a sort of no-hands hug, to avoid covering his dark clothes with floury handprints. “If you want to learn, I’ll teach you. That’s all there is to it.”

Fenris stiffens his shoulders at the hug, but visibly more to avoid the flour. “Alright, alright. But tonight you’re reading. And don’t get flour on my contract.” The prospect of Anders reading to him instead of, say, Aveline, still humiliates him to no end, and he blushes faintly from it. It’s easy enough to convince himself though, the faster Anders can just help him memorize the alphabet the faster he’ll just force himself through it without help.


	13. Chapter 13

There are only a few things they’ll need, and Anders has gathered them: a couple of good oil lamps for light, a stack of books on various topics, and a comfortable place to sit, in this case, Fenris’s bed. And given that Fenris is the student, Anders has brought a bottle of wine up from the cellar as well. The bedroom has gradually been getting tidier, though Anders hasn’t had the opportunity to do much beyond routine and furtive attempts at cleaning. There are new, clean covers on the bed, scavenged from one of the other bedrooms. Anders hopes that Fenris will at least understand the need to change the sheets, which had been showing the signs of their nightly (and often morning-ly) activities.

Fenris has perched himself onto the bed, his leggings still on lest they try to get distracted. As nice as that is, he really does want to learn if he’s going to be going through this humiliation in the first place.  
He picks up the wine, able to firmly grip the bottle and uncork it in his bare hands, and takes a small drink from it as he sets aside the cork on a side table and flips open one of the books with one hand. It all looks like daunting nonsense squiggles, to be frank, and he glares at it a moment before glancing up to the mage. “Have you explored the concept that you may have placed too much faith in me?”

Anders hands Fenris a wax tablet and a wooden stylus. He looks over the stack of books, and picks out a very new-looking one, a recounting of the search and discovery of Andraste’s Ashes by Brother Genitivi. Anders had only read about half of it, but it would preclude forcing Fenris to try and slog through archaic prose right at the start. Genitivi’s writing wasn’t facile, but concise and lucid, and the topic was interesting, leading Anders to hope this was a book to hook Fenris with. "No, love, not even for a moment.“ He sits down on the bed, leaning his back against the headboard. "We’ll start with the alphabet. There are twenty-six letters, and those letters represent sounds, more or less. Arrangements of the letters make words. Is this making sense so far?”

“Yes, save the part where you expect me to memorize it with nothing to remind me, unless you intend to sit here repeating each one.” Fenris pauses at that, realizing he’s letting his early frustration get the better of him already. He sighs, deliberately. “Go on.”

Anders takes the wax tablet back and inscribes the letters of the alphabet in clear upper-case. "That’s what the tablet’s for. There’s also a song, but I didn’t want you to think I was patronizing you. Now come here.“ Anders pats the spot on the bed at his side. "I’ll teach you these one by one, and you can copy each letter yourself.”

Fenris leans out to set the bottle down and abandon it at the table, at least temporarily, and picks up the tablet with him as he obediently moves closer. He settles at Anders’ side, only a bit uncomfortable but not from their proximity, and finally looks at the letters written out in his hands. “There’s more than these, though.” Well at least he’s picked up on that. Still, he starts copying them almost idly, movements slow and paying far too much attention to the details to reproduce each one.

“The other ones are just other versions of these. It’s called ‘lower case.' Here, I’ll show you. This is 'A’. Depending on where it is in a word it can sound like the Ah in Cat, the Ah in Fall, or the Ay in Ate. I’ve written the upper-case A here for you.” Ander takes the stylus and fills in the space he left beside the A. “And this is the lower-case. It’s just different ways to write the same letter.”

 

“I…see.” Fenris sounds a bit distracted as he watches how easily Anders jots down the a, and speeds his gestures along the tablet until he has the rest of the letters down. It’s.. sloppy, but a definite start. He adds a lowercase a to his version and drags over a book to pull it open, scanning the pages and jotting down whatever looks similar enough to link to it’s parent. c, f, j, k, l, m, o, p, s, t, u, v, w, x, y, and eventually z when he finally finds a word using it. Not a bad chunk to figure out on his own, though the rest seem nonsensical.

Anders watches, his eyes widening a bit as Fenris pushes ahead. "And you thought you’d be slow at this.“ There’s nothing mocking in his tone, just a clear appreciation of how quickly Fenris grasped the concept and followed it through. When Fenris is done, Anders fills in the ones he missed. He makes a mental note to go ahead and give Fenris one of his blank journals and some ink, which he would have done already if not for concerns about inkwells, clean sheets, and frustrated warriors. "I should also tell you, there are two categories of letters. Most of them are what’s called 'Consonant.’ The other kind are vowels. Vowels are a bit more fluid than consonants, and what sound they represent is affected by the context they’re in. This is one place where Arcanum is a simpler language; the letters represent the sounds more simply and directly because spoken Arcanum has fewer vowel sounds. The vowels are A, E, I, O, and U.” Anders points to the letters on the tablet as he speaks them. "The rest are consonants, providing a sort of structure the vowels fall into – the harder sounds, the ones that begin and end a syllable. “

Fenris drops his shoulders back against the headboard, his crossed legs unfolding into something looser in front of him but careful not to disturb the books across the bed. "Later.” Talk of vowels and what goes where feels a bit over his head when he hardly knows what each letter stands for. He lifts the tablet and passes it to Anders now that they’ve completed the alphabet at least once between them, the movement dropping his shoulder against the mage’s unconsciously. “Read them.”

Anders takes the tablet and reads the letters one by one. He slips an arm around Fenris’s back, partly for the desire for closeness but partly also to let the both of them settle more comfortably against one another. "Now you,“ Anders says when he finishes, handing the tablet back.

Fenris is visibly distracted the moment Anders puts an arm around him. The elf shifts uncomfortably and retreats closer against the crook of the mage’s shoulder to avoid his hand; it achieves the same goal but likely not exactly how Anders wanted it.

Anders notices Fenris’s discomfort and sighs, his breath stirring Fenris’s hair. "This is something else we need to work on,” he murmurs.

Fenris finds a good enough position, half-turned against Anders with his hand safely hanging past the elf’s shoulders in the air, and grumbles. “We could work on tying your hands.” For a few long moments he does debate just telling Anders to sod off, as there isn’t a single other mage he intends to touch unless it’s on a path to their vital organs.

“I could be content with that if you didn’t have the most perfect ass in Thedas. I’m looking forward to the day I can -really- grab a handfull of that. Besides, I have enough bedroom etiquette that I hate not being able to give you a reach-around.” Anders is smiling, puckish. "And I have an idea.“

Fenris presses a palm over his eyes, in an active attempt to hide his blush as he very self consciously chuckles. The amount of shamelessness just throws him too easily but it’s such a far cry from the uptight silence of slaves in Tevinter, the fear of saying anything lest you stand out. "I’m going to regret asking what.”

“I’ll ask you for permission to touch you. You can give it or you can refuse. And if you give it, I’ll put my hand on you, and when it gets to be too much, tell me and I’ll remove it.” It’s simple and straightforward, and based on Anders’s guess that being able to determine for himself what was enough would make it easiest on Fenris, and gradually divorce the coercive element from his experience of being touched.

Fenris’ hand slips from his face, fingers dragging to a stop over his lips as he regards Anders gaze and proposal. At length nods, though already a bit silently edgy from the prospect, muscles in his shoulders pulling together unconsciously. “As you wish.”

Anders nods to that, his cheek rubbing Fenris’s ear. "May I touch your hair?“

Fenris hesitates with something so major as his head, narrowing his eyes as he glances away. "Fine.”

“Not really,” Anders says softly. He doesn’t expect Fenris to consent easily, but when his words and his body language clash that strongly, it’s a signal to back off. "May I put my hand on your hand?“

"You should make up your mind before I change mine, mage.” It looks like there’s only going to be so much he’s going to easily comply with, even if he silently agrees that it needs to be done.

“Fine,” Anders sighs, and he slides his fingers through Fenris’s hair, the touch as gentle as Anders generally is. He shuts his eyes. With such indulgence a limited commodity, he tries his best to feel as completely as he can, and to remember. “I feel like I should offer you something, to make up for… this.”

“You already do too much.” Fenris winces as his skin instantly starts to crawl, almost painful from how his nerves shoot a web of panic to the nearest muscles. It’s a bit like if Anders wanted to touch him gently with a handful of scalpels. But he forces himself to stay put, even as his breathing grows unpleasantly shallow and quick. “You better be enjoying this.”

Anders makes an indulgent murmur as he goes on running his hand through Fenris’s hair, ruffling it. “I’m surprised Merrill doesn’t molest you more. She likes fluffy things.” He kisses Fenris’s temple. “Talk to me… it might make this easier if you let your mind wander.”

“About what?!” Fenris snaps back, though he uneasily cools immediately after. “I can’t concentrate.” Holding a conversation will be a challenge, much less daydreaming aloud. “Tell me something I don’t know about you.”

“The first time I escaped from the Circle tower, I swam across Lake Calenhad in my underwear. I was thirteen and I didn’t have a plan to speak of, but the opportunity presented itself and there I went.” Anders chuckles under his breath at the memory. “It took the Templars a week to catch me. When they caught up with me I led them on such a chase… I actually thought it was funny back then, but they certainly didn’t. Dragged me back in chains after knocking my teeth loose. Wynne had to put them back in my head herself.”

Fenris quirks a smile at that, the expression awkwardly mixed with his discomfort. He manages to last until Anders goes quiet, then tosses his head and turns to better hide it against Anders’ shoulder. “Somewhere else.” His head tips to nuzzle against the mage’s skin, as if his hand being there so long left some magey residue that needs to be brushed off.

“May I put my hand on your hip?” Anders is inwardly amused by the idea of giving Fenris Mage Cooties. He also realizes he would’ve tormented Fenris with this aversion in his younger days, crawling his hands over Fenris like spiders, or making them attack him like angry geese, complete with honking. Fortunately he’s matured, or just become boring, because he’s sure Fenris would have killed him. "…Not that I’m sure it mattered,“ Anders continues. "Apprentices mostly get gruel to begin with. The only time I was ever glad of that were the couple of months I was with Karl. I spent so much time holding my jaws open that it hurt to chew bread.”

Fenris waves a hand as he settles his cheek glumly against Anders’ shoulder, already tired of having to repeatedly answer. “It’s fine, just don’t-” The sentence is cut short before he can tell Anders to not pick his hand up as he moves, thinking better of it. Getting to his hip would mean passing over several spaces that really would send him flying, like his neck or flanks. “Just tell me first.” He crosses his arms over his chest, and tries his best to forget about it all. Right, so easy. “You miss him.”

“Yes,” Anders says quietly, his hand settling on Fenris’s hip and his arm giving him a tender squeeze. “He was a good mage, a brilliant one. He talked me out of escaping again, at least for a while, did his best to get me to tolerate the Templars, to learn to live with things in the Circle. That’s why I wanted to get him out, when it was too much even for him to bear. He was older than me by… I’d rather not say how much. It would make him sound like a dreadful pervert. But I was utterly willing. When everything you do is wrong by default, there are a lot of lines you can cross without a thought. And it was a thrill… hiding under his bed after curfew, getting up in his robes and realizing there was at least one thing I could do to at least one person that would make somebody happy…”

Every last muscle around Anders’ fingers go on end in a quick wave under the lean skin, the reaction far rougher than the vaguer signs of discomfort from his head being touched. His side and abs spring taught first, and the tightness travels down his leg enough that it flinches a couple inches to the air. While he’s able to will it back down his body refuses to relax, all but shivering in place.  
And he’s supposed to hold a conversation of some sort. He takes a moment to reflect on Karl’s age, as the thought hadn’t bothered him when he didn’t know what the man really meant to Anders. “So you made him wait for your inevitable return each time you ran off?”

“No. We broke things off when one of the Templars started getting suspicious. Mages aren’t allowed romance. Honest Templars see it as a weakness my kind can’t afford. Dishonest ones see it as a way to get a hold over us, something to threaten us with. After Karl I never fooled around with another mage, unless we both knew it was going to be a one night stand. I -can- tell you where to find every glory hole in the Ferelden circle tower, though…” Anders watches Fenris struggle against his flinching and he sighs in sympathy, nuzzling in, kissing his neck.

“Disgusting.” Fenris makes an attempt to dodge from the kiss but doesn’t get all that far, a little distant as his breathing picks up, rising his stomach in short, small patterns. “I don’t want to imagine where your mouth has been.” Without mention he blindly finds Anders’ hand with his own, and entwines his fingers to pick the palm up gently. His breathing slows immediately to something calmer, and his muscles reluctantly loosen.

Anders stifles a frustrated sigh when Fenris tries to evade his kiss. He doesn’t resist Fenris’s hand lifting his away, and as Fenris calms, he does as well. "Still fewer places than Isabela’s has, I suspect. Are you alright?“

"No.” Fenris grumbles but his shoulders slump, and he props his cheek lightly against Anders’ hair. “But I want to be. This is going to take longer than I’d hoped.”

Anders eases further as Fenris rests against him, letting tension he hadn’t realized was there ebb away. "Then it takes however long it takes.“ There’s still some lingering, uncomfortable barb on Anders’s conscience. The feeling that he’s been torturing Fenris with this, that he has something to make up for.

Fenris sighs, exhausted. He carefully places Anders’ hand away from him, but gives the knuckles a small squeeze before letting go, and crosses his arms over his chest. It doesn’t matter if he does though, as he says aloud what it means soon enough. "I think I’m done learning your ways, for now.”

“Maybe you should teach me some of yours,” Anders murmurs.

Fenris smirks humorlessly at that. “I can’t imagine you’d want to. The only ‘ways’ I have are from the Qunari and Tevinter.” The mention of Tevinter isn’t filled with as much venom as it usually is. He just assumes Anders would have no interest.

“Was there anything in your life before that you enjoyed?” Anders is curious. While being a slave in Tevinter is not something he’d ever expect to be a walk in the park, it’s also hard to imagine it being an experience of unrelieved drudgery and horror.

“No.” Fenris is quick to respond to that, a bit too much so, and tightens his grasp over his arms. “Nothing that matters now.”

/Even my words hurt him./ The thought flashes through Anders’s mind too quickly for him to suppress. And then the familiar cascade of /I can’t do anything right./ It goes on from there, and Anders simply falls silent, his eyes tired and dull.

Fenris hardly notices it, too momentarily locked against a flood of things he’d rather not remember. But he also misinterprets the silence a bit, and at length adds to his words with determination. “The things I enjoyed then were the things a slave enjoys.”

“I see.” Anders’s tone is mild and distant, both his voice and his words almost absent of any real content. He should have known that everything Fenris remembers would be soured by the abuse he’d experienced. He shouldn’t have been stupid enough to ask. It was selfish of him.

Here Fenris had finally excised whatever demon that had suddenly loomed up to haunt his mind, and Anders’ simple reply seems so.. bewildering. Fenris gently breaks free of them, and his legs fold under him again while he leans forward to gather the books spread over the bedsheets. Of course, he takes the moment to look back at the mage over his shoulder. “What is it?”

 

“Nothing.” His voice is just as blandly mild. He shifts a bit on the bed, swinging his legs down off the edge, and looks around. There should be something on his mind, something to do next, but nothing occurs to him. It seems better if he does nothing. At least that way no one gets hurt. He stands up slowly, gives Fenris an apologetic smile, and turns to leave. In his mind, this is still Fenris’s room, and it’s easy to convince himself he’s intruding.

Fenris is just.. baffled, completely and utterly. And here part of his whole point was that you can’t comfortably fuck on a bed with books all over it, but it doesn’t exactly work when half of the equation is leaving. “Anders.”

Anders stops compliantly enough and turns, looking just as puzzled. "You need something?“

Fenris tilts his head to one side at that, eyes narrowing as he tries to figure out what suddenly got into him. "Where are you going?”

“Just… leaving you be. I’ve given you enough grief for one day, I think.” Anders chuckles at that, a nervous sound, an implied apology. "Do you need anything?“

Only one answer comes to that. And Fenris doesn’t hesitate; when he’s already been so vulnerable what would a bit more hurt. "I need you.”

Anders stops short, his cascade of self-recriminations finally halting. "I’m here,“ he says, life coming back to his voice, to his eyes, sharp and rough and hungry. He steps in close, breathless as he leans in to offer an open-mouthed kiss. Breathless and …shaking.

Fenris catches Anders’ shoulders, grip intense enough to be threatening as he tries to still the mage, and he meets their kiss together roughly enough that their teeth click against it. But as harsh as their impact is, the elf also manages to pry their lips apart just as firmly. "Tell me what’s gotten into you.” And by the feel of it he doesn’t intend to let go until he gets a good answer.

“I hate causing you pain. I /hate it/…” Anders clenches his teeth, sucking in a ragged breath. Fenris’s grip hurts and he loves it, the pain and the contact anchoring him here, making this real. "I hate… what I am. I try to tell myself that I’m not weak, I’m not corrupt, but I hurt everything I touch.“ He swallows. "I’m sorry… As though you need more mage wretchedness in your life…”

Fenris gives a tiny shake of his head, eyebrows raising in sympathy for something he hadn’t realized. “You’re not the one hurting me. Danarius is.” He turns his head and looks away, mainly to glare at nothing in particular. “Every time I just feel… him.” But he looks back slowly, eyes intensely determined, fiery despite their color. “You’re the reason I want to keep trying.”

It takes Anders a moment to answer. He nods, pulling together some tattered scraps of calm. "I knew it would be hard for you. I didn’t realize how hard it would be for me. I will keep trying, as long as you want me to.“ He lifts his head, his eyes wandering over Fenris’s features. The shape of his eyes, the twist at the corners of his mouth. He doesn’t know how to explain the way that at times, the endless recriminations, the fear and disgust of others, comes back in a flood no matter how hard he tries to shrug it off. A lifetime of being reviled is a lot to bury.

Fenris pulls Anders close again, but this time raises a hand to brush along the man’s temple and into his hair. "Please. If you don’t I’ll just be left with him, no matter how far I run.”

Anders leans his head into Fenris’s touch like an affectionate cat. "I may not deserve you, but he -surely- doesn’t. ..“ Fenris’s body feels warm and solid against him, and Anders realizes he feels starved for touch and tenderness. "I need you,” he murmurs.

It’s somber, but Fenris actually smiles at that, as Anders echoes his earlier statement. “What makes you think a slave deserves more than an abomination that’s selfless to a fault and likes cats.” It only fades as he glances back to the bed, and adds. “Sit, I’ll tell you anything you want to know.” The offer makes his insides a little uncomfortable at the thought, but being uncomfortable seems to be a given for the relationship. It’s something he’s willing to give when he sees people like Hawke, making ‘normal’ seem like something easily won.

Anders looks back at Fenris with affectionate reproach, but he sits down on the edge of the bed. "I hardly even know what to ask. Favorite food, favorite color, whether you enjoy music, whether you’ve ever played a prank on someone… You don’t let on much about things you like. Probably explains why you’re so damned good at cards.“ Anders sounds mildly annoyed by that fact.

"You /had/ to pick the hard questions.” The worst part is, he sounds completely serious as he sits at Anders’ side. “I don’t know. Green, I guess.” He draws up a foot to the edge of the bed, propping his elbow against the raised knee as his palm rests against his brow. These things require actual thought, apparently. “I had dormouse, once. I’m sure they thought it was funny, giving something so rich to the slave, but after years of bread and bland slivers of meat it didn’t matter.”

“Dormouse? You mean… mice? They eat mice in Tevinter?” The look on Anders’s face suggests that, even moreso than all the slavery and blood sacrifice, this confirms that all of Tevinter is insane.

Fenris glances over and suppresses a chuckle. “Only the ones who can afford it. That was the only time I ever had one… and then Hadriana starved me for a week.” Something about the faintly smug look on his face says it was worth it, seeing how angry she’d gotten over it.

“I admit, that’s a recipe I’ll need to track down.” Anders suspects that, depending on the other details of the dish, he could substitute chicken or goose for the mice. “The food in the Circle was nothing special, either. Bread and water, gruel, and milk if you were lucky. The Enchanters got better, but I never ranked that high. And prisoners, of course, got worse.” He half-smiles and shrugs. “That’s why I learned to cook. When I escaped, first thing I wanted was usually a good meal and a warm slice of pie. Not that anything I make is all that fancy.”

Fenris nods absently, too used to bread and water to even hate it anymore. “I never played a prank on anyone. It would be nice to say I was too afraid to, but I never had the concept of one until I was left with the Fog Warriors.” He pauses, and adds, “I knew of something similar, but backstabbing your friends isn’t as fun I hear.”

“What are the Fog Warriors like? I know almost nothing of them, except they fight both the Imperium and the Qunari. They must like a hard fight.” Anders shakes his head, trying to imagine a force that would take on not one major power but two. The only answer, he supposes, is that they considered submission to either to be no choice at all.

“Free.” There’s a clear fondness on that word, one he really hadn’t comprehended until then. “They hold no dreams of victory. It’s simply something they must do. As soon as I was well enough, they ordered me around for small tasks. It was.. comforting.” The Fog must have taken other slave, just this way.

Anders smiles to hear that fondness in Fenris’s voice, to see him remembering his first taste of freedom. “They did well by you,” he says with gratitude in his voice. “I would like to go to Seheron someday. I hear there are tigers there.” It’s obvious that Anders really, really wants to see a tiger someday.

Fenris’ expression falls, not to something sour but more wistful and vaguely nostalgic. “And I killed them for it. I’m sorry, I’d say we could go if I was naive enough to think they wouldn’t slay me at their first chance.”

“Maybe there’s a way to make amends. Anyway… it would likely be far in the future.” Anders rests his chin on Fenris’s shoulder, leaning slightly against him. “I am so glad for your freedom, you know. Glad twice over you would let me near, like this.”

“A mystery, even to me.” Fenris turns his head to lightly prop against Anders’. “It’s funny. Even now, I feel more that I belong in Tevinter than here.” He takes a heavy breath of air, very purposeful as he breathes in Anders’ smell, and sighs it out along with yet another memory he’ll never forget. “I’m out of place everywhere, and I’m told I should go to the alienage, when I feel no connection to the people there.”

“It’s a bit like Varric said. That you drift through this city like a ghost.” Anders speaks softly, still leaning close. “Maybe where no connection exists, you can make one with some effort. Meet people, involve yourself with them. I would have found little in common with the Ferelden refugees that I healed, but when I helped them, they took me in as their own, even knowing that I’m an apostate.” Once again, it comes down to what Fenris wants… and Anders is beginning to realize that Fenris has difficulty knowing what he wants, or what he needs. It makes a sad sort of sense. His needs have been ignored, his desires irrelevant, for all his life as a slave.

“I don’t particularly want to. They will feel a kinship where there is none.” In a way, even being an elf feels a bit alien. Not that he feels human, he just.. is. ‘A slave’ still feels apt, even if free. “I’m alone, here. Being a ghost is likely a fitting description.”

 

“But you don’t have to be.” There’s an edge of frustration in Anders’s voice. “At least, no moreso than everybody is.” Anders nuzzles hard against Fenris’s shoulder, eyes closed. “I won’t leave you alone. It hurts to even think about.”

Fenris raises his hand to find Anders’ shoulder, pulls them apart to regard the man seriously. “Don’t. Even if it hurts to be at your side, don’t leave me like you tried to.” He watches for an answer, as if it could be something different from the obvious. But then, it’s important. If Anders leaves he may as well go back to Danarius now.

Anders replies with a slow nod, looking Fenris directly in the eyes. “I will stay. If it hurts, I’ll share your pain.”

Fenris is silent a moment, soaking in Anders’ blunt honesty, before he practically crashes forward with an unbearable urgency to kiss him. His hand loosens from the mage’s shoulder to brush through his blonde hair, fingers knitting amongst the softness and tightening just enough to secure them against each other. The knee he’d pulled up drops as he turns halfway along the mattress, pressing down into the bed as leverage.

Anders answers the kiss with a startled moan. His lips part, teeth clacking just briefly from the suddenness of the kiss, but he takes it in, lips warm and supple. His hands lift for an instant in the impulse to grapple with Fenris, but he subdues it, forcing his hands down and gripping fistfulls of the bedcovers. Being with Fenris may always be like this, Anders has the hopeful realization. Not the inability to lay his hands on the elf’s body, but the explosiveness of his passion. He could seem so calm, disciplined, so very tightly buttoned down, only launching into things like this when his bottled-up intensity explosively boiled over. And it was scalding hot, and so very welcome, so very needed.

Fenris isn’t oblivious to the movements of Anders’ hands, his earlier frustration still fresh, and one of Isabela’s comments from one of their times at the pub sticks in his mind. His free hand clamps onto the side of Anders’ chest, the heel of his palm grinding against the rougher fabric between them as it sinks firmly enough to commit to memory every rib, then a softer give as his hand falls from the chest and finally lands along his hip. His palm fits so perfectly over the bone, and stretching his thumb over the front he leans in to push them both farther onto the bed.

Anders follows the urgings of Fenris’s hands, shifting back onto the bed. He pauses when he can to steal a few more hungry kisses, as if he can only breath the warm breath from Fenris’s mouth and the cooler air of the room just leaves him gasping. His skin is warm under the thin linen of his shirt, and his body stretches and arcs into Fenris’s touch. As his hand reaches the crest of his hip, his twitching cock grows stiff and full, a straining bulge in his trousers.

The elf is really no better off, the erection silhouetted perfectly as it begins to strain against the tightly form fitting leggings. Fenris’ hands find the edge of Anders’ tunic and pull it up, his fingers dragging along the skin it had just travelled along, this time light and breezing. Reluctantly he pulls them both apart so the shirt can be thrown away from them, but for all his hesitance Fenris is paused as he takes a moment to stare. He’s hungry, breathing already heavier as it moves his chest, but not feverish enough to not stop and appreciate how the mage’s paler skin looks against the bed, his hardon plump and impatient. Somehow he manages to tear his gaze away, and reaches past them for the small container of oil on the bedstand.

Anders lays back, shoulders pressed into the bed as he lifts up his hips and shoves his pants down, giving Fenris a fine view of his arching body, his erection resting on his belly, dripping on the fine line of gingery fuzz that runs from his navel to his groin. When he settles back again he kicks off his boots, kicks away his rolled-down trousers. He can see the hunger in Fenris’s eyes and it sets off an aching sweetness. Unwanted by anyone for so much of his life, to find this person who wants him with all his being… it’s like balm on raw wounds. He licks his lips to wet them as he watches Fenris reaching for the oil.

Fenris sets the container down on the bed beside them, raising his shoulders as he grips the side edges of his leggings to force them out of the way, his cock thick and lightly bobbing in the open air. Anders doesn’t get the sight for long as Fenris moves back and down to kiss the underside of the mage’s erection, lips dragging loosely over the skin where the tip meets the shaft, and parts his mouth just enough to lick it. What he touches is surprisingly soft, and despite his initial intention Fenris explores with several more kisses placed slowly down the throat, lingering without real cause as he reaches out blindly and pulls Anders’ belt from his pants. When his lips touch the small space just before Anders’ balls he lifts away, and crawls forward to catch the mage’s wrists.

Anders moans. His gaze is rivetted on Fenris’s mouth, watching those perfectly-shaped lips kiss and touch, his erection standing proud and twitching hard enough to dab another drop of precum just below his navel. When he sees what Fenris intends, he offers his wrists, hands closed in loose fists. There’s vivid color in his cheeks, in his lips allready, and his heart is pounding hard.

For a moment Fenris’ chest is over Anders’ head, relaxed but still tightly sculpted stomach inches away from his face, and their erections unintentionally nuzzling together as the elf throws a loop over both wrists and hooks the belt between them, and finally up to close the buckle, latching it securely to the headboard. His hands slip down Anders’ arms and hook over his shoulders, and he gives the man a small shove against the bonds to prove to himself that they’ve been done tightly enough. All too finally he turns his attention back to the oil, sitting up as he gently places a knee between Anders’ legs and preses down to separate his thighs.

Anders gives his bonds a sharper tug, making the leather pull even tighter around his wrists, gouging only slightly and holding firm. His knees spread for Fenris, and he lifts his head to watch, vulnerability and anticipation mixing, catalyzing one another. “Praise the Maker,” he whispers in a trembling sigh.

Fenris settles his hips between them as he unscrews the top to the oil and dips his fingers into it, a thick coat of gloss covering them as he rubs it across his cock, the oil mixing with the precum moistening the tip. He suppresses a small groan as his erection becomes slippery in his palm, making everything quick and supple. But he stops, and leaves his dick dripping with lust as it hovers over the erection below it, and he wets his fingers again before closing the container and lowering his hand to Anders’ ass. His thumb and pinky spread the cheeks away, baring the small bud of flesh as his middle finger swirls around it, then presses in easily. Fenris leans forward as he adds another finger to slowly piston into the hole, his lips finding Anders’ chest and suckling at a nipple.

Fenris’s slick fingers have Anders panting. His supple pucker tenses, then flexes open as Fenris’s fingers stroke and plunge inside. He craves more, so much more, deeper and harder than Fenris’s agile fingers can give, but the feeling is still delicious, and his hips lift slightly to offer himself. Fenris’s lips at his nipple elicit a sweet little gasp. His nipples are firm and rosey, tightening so hard it almost hurts when Fenris sucks one between his teeth. He wets lips gone dry from his slow panting, unable to take his eyes off Fenris. The elf is beautiful, even moreso when there’s lust in his eyes, but the dizzying haze of need aside, it was so rare to see Fenris take pleasure in anything. 

Fenris lifts his head to place a kiss more center on Anders’ chest, and drags his burning lips up to suck at the crook of the mage’s neck. He removes his fingers and hooks his hands under Anders’ legs to prop them up along his shoulders, then moves his slick hand down to press his erection against the oiled bud. He leans his hips forward, and the plump tip gives a bit as it pressures against the entrance before the oil helps the intrusion, and he slides into the tight space with a loud, surprised moan.

Anders’s body tenses. The muscles in his legs tighten, his toes curling, his knees up against Fenris’s shoulders. His body curls, rising hips accepting that first burning plunge, Anders moaning out loud. Fenris’s cock is thick and barely yielding inside him, and his insides adjust in a slow, rolling spasm that grinds its head against a firming spot inside him. He looks down at first at where their bodies join, unable to think of anything but the pressure, the fullness inside him. Sucking in a breath of air he lifts his chin, watches Fenris’s face and reads the signs of pleasure in it. This time he’ll get to watch him come, watch every delicious second of blushing and lip biting and mounting urgency.

Pleasure seems to be easy enough to find at least as it washes over the elf’s face. His hips rock against the tight ring with the same force as he did their first time, only now the limiting, uncomfortable friction is gone and leaves him smacking against Anders’ ass with each thrust. Eyes squeezing shut as his mouth parts for air, he blindly finds the small curves of hipbones below him and covers each with a palm. He tightens his grip and holds Anders firmly in place as he gains momentum, pounding as he starts to worry less about them hurting each other and more closely following his instincts.

Anders tries to match Fenris’s rhythm before the warrior’s grip anchors his hips in place. Then, there’s nothing to do but receive. Fenris is thrusting hard, hard enough that he aches, but the ache is sublime, the ache is perfect, and he could never be sated with anything less. He groans with each impact, his face and chest flushed pink and hot, sweat already forming on his forehead, on his lip. His groans turn almost to sobs as pleasure grows, his cock standing stiff in a subtle curve over his belly and dripping precum onto his abdomen, enough to form a glistening puddle. He tugs at his bonds without even thinking, craving a solid grip on his hard-on. “M…more…” Anders rasps, looking down at their fucking as if he can’t believe the feeling building inside him. “Maker, please, /more/…!” The words flow out in an urgent moan.

At some point Fenris must notice Anders’ intense erection, if nothing else from his skin lightly teasing at the underside with the caresses of their passionate struggling movements against each other. But he does nothing to sate it until he hears Anders beg. A slick hand peels off from the hip it was mated to, Fenris’ grip seemingly no less from it, and closes a firm grip around the neglected cock. The oil equally massaged into his pores by now leave his hand silky as he matches his rough thrusts with a downstroke of his hand, tight as he drags back up the shaft.

Anders’s eyes lose focus, glazed and dark, wide and disbelieving, as a loud groan comes from his throat. His drum-tight cock jumps in Fenris’s hand, Anders struggling, squirming under Fenris’s thrusting hips. Anders feels a fresh burn in his cheeks, realizing that Fenris answered his begging as if he’s been hoping to coax it from him all along. He throws himself into the shame of it. “Please…please fuck me harder…” he moans. He can feel his balls drawing up tight to the base of his shaft, pleasure winding in him like a coiled spring.

Fenris’ teeth bite down on his bottom lip hard, painful but unnoticed. His muscles have started to shudder from the effort, every muscle tightening up to his shoulders and down his arms. His abs flex enough to start tingling with pain as his climax builds, and with Anders’ pleas his legs and toes dig roughly against the bed. Every slap of Anders’ ass against his balls teases him, tightening with a sparking fire begging for it’s own release. The fist wrapped around the man’s erection slows to a halt as it pulls up to the dripping slit, Fenris’ thumb swirling over the tip then caps the hole, the plump head pressed slowly each way as he firmly massages the dip.

“FENRIS!” Anders’s head slams back against the mattress. The first heavy spurts of his seed flood up around Fenris’s working thumb, and Anders’ hips jerk and buck as much as they can. His whole body is shuddering, bucking and twisting under Fenris with a ferocity, a raw physicality the mage has never shown. He screams, his voice ragged, heedlessly loud, sweat and involuntary tears running from the corners of his eyes to his temples. His cock is leaping in Fenris’s grip, pulsing hard with every surge of cream that spills onto Anders’ belly and splatters his chest.

Fenris’ teeth loosen and his lip falls with his jaw, the skin puffy and red from the bite. His thrusts slow, hard as he finds deep purchase, and his hand digs against Anders’ hip as he buries himself completely. With a spasming shiver the energy building up in him explodes, and his hips nuzzle roughly against ass as his cock throbs and spurts thick waves of cum into the man’s ass. Slowly, deliberately he starts to rock them against each other, hand sliding back down the shaft of Anders’ orgasming erection as he tightly pumps and milks them both. Eventually his hips start to slow again and he drops his head to the crook of Anders’ neck in exhaustion, the end of this long ear brushing against the mage’s cheek.

Fenris’s own climax stretches Anders’ onward until it nearly becomes unbearable. The pleasure stops short of too much and becomes just enough, all his need slaked by the pounding cock inside him, the tight grip on his shaft. Heat radiates off Anders’ flushed skin, and his chest rises and falls as Fenris rests on it. Another man’s weight would be uncomfortable, but the feeling of Fenris collapsed on him, warm, solid and breathing, is something he can’t imagine himself refusing. He rests his cheek against the side of Fenris’s hair, breathing deep, feeling warm wetness trickle along the cleft of his ass, and Fenris’s thick hardon softening inside him.

After a few long moments of them being nothing more than a heavy pile of hot breathing and little movement Fenris stirs again, slipping out and shifting to let Anders’ legs down. He shoves the heel of his cleaner hand against the bed, locking his elbow as he props himself up to survey the damage and ecstasy. “I suppose this means I should let you go, now.”

Anders’s legs settle limp upon the bed. He can feel a burn in his tendons from having been stretched rather relentlessly, but it’s a satisfying ache. The best sex, he thinks, leaves you with something to remember it by the next day. If he was beautiful when they began, Anders is moreso now in the aftermath, the remains of his sex-flush and sweat making his pale skin pearly, his lean chest rising and falling, his cream pooled and splattered and smeared over his belly and chest. Anders looks up hazily at his bound wrists. His hands are beginning to feel swollen, the leather biting him uncomfortably, tightened by his struggling. “Yes, please.” His murmur is a bit slurred by the afterglow. The look he gives Fenris is pure affection and contentment.

That may be the first time anyone’s ever said please. And really meant it, anyway. Lazily Fenris reaches up and fiddles with the belt, taking a little longer when he only has one hand and has to be careful to not smear the leather with the mix of oil and orgasm. As soon as the belt is unlatched from itself he rolls off of Anders and onto his back at the mage’s side. Still, he manages to drop his head to one side to keep an eye on Anders’ body.

Anders rubs his wrists for a moment, something made a bit more challenging by the way all his joints feel like water. His arms drop to his side and he turns his head, looking back at Fenris and smiling without realizing it at first. “I’m glad you like to be on top. You’re too good at it to let the skill go to waste.” His gaze meanders down the elf’s long, nude body, admiring his sleek perfection, and the strange grace of the curving, curling lines.

Fenris cracks a tired smile at that and tips his head back upwards, his clean hand raising to brush back his mussed hair from his forehead as it’s doing a nice job of trying to get into his eyes now that he’s lying down. It’s possibly a rarer sight than his naked body at this point, eyebrows relaxed and hair pulled back enough to fully show his profile. The token larger eyes are usually too veiled with his mood to be noticed but now they just catch the light so well like they’re meant to. “Flattery will get you nowhere. I’m too tired.” Give him a night and then try.

Anders laughs quietly, so much fondness in his voice. “I’m not trying to seduce you, I’d be coming sawdust if I tried to do anything now…. for which I blame and thank you, Serrah Fenris,” he says, sleepily playful. “But sometimes I feel as if my heart would burst if I didn’t say -something-…”  
Anders adds dreamily, “You have /pretty/ eyes…”

Fenris glances over in a small fit of self conscious panic, before his brain decides it’s too tired for this nonsense and he just closes his eyes to cut it all off at the pass. “Somehow I manage. Stop being wonderful, mage. I can’t be mad at you at this rate.”

Anders grins and shuts his eyes, shifting for a bit more body contact with Fenris. “I’ll try, but, ah well. You know how I am.”

“Mm.” That’s the most apt answer he can muster. He supposes he should be worried at how predictably they’ll fall into all out arguments, but he can’t imagine those not ending with make up sex, at this point. Shoving the sex out of his mind a moment, the elf tries to recall what they were doing before they got.. distracted. “If you want to ask me anything else, you should while you still can.” Otherwise he’s likely going to change his mind.


	14. Chapter 14

Now and then, The Hanged Man has nights that seem quieter than the rest. There’s no actual reason for it, though some of the drunks that drown themselves every night without fail will say some gibberish about the moon phases and things aligning. Point being, it’s not completely empty but there’s several large tables open, the staff actually attentive to the resident drunks and.. well, residents. Various smells and smoke still linger the place, the thick air all the more noticeable when it’s not as loud as it can be, and the glow from fire and candles traveling further with less people to break it with shadows.  
A plus that Isabela is taking advantage of, a small map spread out on the table in front of her while she drinks her ale with an odd absence.

 

Anders steps in from the Lowtown streets, a hooded cloak on over his coat. He passes a sealed envelope discretely to one of the serving girls, just an errand for Mistress Selby; he would run letters for her even without the attendant payments, something which she knows. She wavers between stiffing him in leaner times and making up for it later with small bonuses. Every now and then, she almost seems to like him.  
It’s an unusual thing, though not unheard of, to see Isabela looking pensive, and at such times Anders can’t help but wonder what goes on underneath her constant bawdy humor and flouting of all authority. He liked that in her, though he’d grown a bit less likely to associate acts of rebellion with liberty, since Justice. He glances around for signs of Merrill and finds none, so he walks over to Isabela’s table. "May I join you, Isabela?“

Isabela just looks grumpier as he approaches, and as she looks up she starts to briskly roll the map up. "Of course, creampuff. I was just making sure this map was just as useless as I thought it was going to be.” She dramatically sighs as she shoves the map back into her belt, knowing better than to toss a map even when it looks like a complete waste. She takes a quick drink from her mug, and looks like she’s finally seeing Anders. Or the fact that he’s alone, mainly. “Oh /please/ don’t tell me he ran off again.”

Anders shakes his head, a hint of a smile on his face. He’s looking well, actually. He’s been sleeping more, and better, in Fenris’s bed, and the belief that Fenris should live on something other than wine and stale bread had meant he himself was living on more than pottage and ale. His cheeks are less hollow, his fair skin less sallow, the shadows under his eyes far softer. "No, I was just running an errand on my way back to Hightown. Everything’s well with me, for once,“ he says dryly.

"Ah. Dare anyone separate you two from an amazing fuck. /Speaking of which/,” Isabela scootches and drags her mug across the table until she’s altogether too close, her shoulder practically burying itself amidst the feathers of Anders’ coat. “Tell me everything, if you’re gonna be sitting here. Come now, gush with Isabela.”

Anders’s smile spreads wider, an uncommonly playful and happy expression on a frequently somber face. "I was hoping you’d ask.“ With the discomfort of having the entire group gathered for public scrutiny of a newly blossomed romance asside, it’s true. He’s been dying to talk to someone about Fenris. Fenris gets annoyed when his gushing grows excessive, and the topic of Fenris tends to bring out something strange in Justice… something that makes them dissolve into confused bickering before Justice returns to an odd, uneasy silence.   
Anders leans towards Isabela a bit, his voice hushed. "He is absolutely amazing in every way, and he has no idea how incredible he is. I desperately need to ask you for advice on how to give him a compliment he’ll actually -take-. As for the rest, I don’t even know where to start. It’s… intense, with him. More than anything I’ve ever had.” Anders cheeks show a bit of color, his tone gradually fading from mischief to quiet awe.

Isabela can’t help but giggle at Anders’ eagerness to share. “Just keep complimenting his eyes and his dick, those are the only things that aren’t covered in lyrium and he won’t complain about it. The rest he hates.” But she stops in the middle of being conspiratorial, and listens to Anders completely go on. “You’re adorable when you’re in love, you know that? I mean it, not like your other flings.”

“What other flings?” Anders gives a grim laugh. Fenris had ended an embarrassingly long dry spell.  
Anders props his chin on his hand. "And I believe you, and believe me when I tell you I -need- to gush a bit to you because when I’m with him I get wretchedly cloying. I can’t help myself, really. He’s… sweet. I never expected him to be so sweet, behind all those barbs and bitterness. But I think I understand what it’s all meant to protect, now.“ Anders smile turns a bit bashful, self-conscious. "We switch, by the way.”

“Good point.” Isabela had sort of just assumed Anders had kept on keeping on the way she’d seen him at The Pearl, but now that she comes to think about it she hadn’t seen him at The Rose. Those counted as flings, as far as her personal relationship slider worked.  
And then she nearly chokes on her next gulp of ale, and gasps for air and surprise. “Switch? I can’t imagine he’d let you.” She pauses, then adds, “I can’t imagine you topping a man. Do go on.”

“I happen to be pretty good at it,too,” Anders answers in undisguised irritation. “Do I really look like that much of a swisher? I’ve been wearing trousers these days and everything! Maker’s breath…” He shakes his head, still fixing a peeved look on Isabela. "He asked me to. We’d finished and cleaned up not long before you and everybody else swooped down on us that day.“ He glances over to the booth where they’d sat for said swooping. It was, of course, bad.  
"It was better the second time. Plenty of oil, and Fenris on his side with one of those long, long legs over my shoulder…” The smile on Anders’s face turns a shade smug at that. "Maker, the way he /moaned/… he shut himself up like he didn’t think he could even /make/ that sound.“

It’s only obvious that Isabela was fishing well after her initial words, when her cheshire cat smile creeps over her face. He started spilling details, didn’t he, and that’s all she cared about. "Probably didn’t. Who else do you really think he’s slept with?” Isabela tips her ale, finishing the last of it and catching the eye of an idling waitress to bring more. “Well. Other than me. And he sounded more like a wild animal then.”

Anders realizes he took the bait and sighs, acknowledging Isabela’s victory. “You could’ve just asked… or offered to trade. Sometimes I wonder what he’s like with you.” Anders’s smile slants into more of a facial shrug. “It -must- be good to be able to touch him. I can’t put my hands on him, it… disturbs him too much.”

“Mmm, I can’t lie. He was delicious.” Coming from Isabela, that probably means something. She props her elbows on the table as she cradles her mug in her hands, using the slight shift forward to get a better view of Anders’ reactions as she looks at him sidelong. “If you can’t use your hands, why not just lick him? Problem solved.”

“Oh, I have licked him in quite a few places. Not the same as being able to hold him, but it’s certainly not bad…” Anders’s eyes seem to glaze a bit in satisfaction at the memories that brings up. “I can taste the Lyrium on him,” he says with a lustful sigh. “Lyrium, leather, and clean sweat…” A bit of color rises to his cheeks.

Isabela sighs wistfully. “I am going to /miss/ those nights.” But she shakes out of her memories quickly enough. “Numb him while he’s sleeping? What he won’t know won’t hurt, right?” Yes, she really just suggested that. “Or sleeping pills. Then you can touch him all you want.”

Anders gazes sidelong at Isabela. “You’re /kidding/, right? Please tell me you’re kidding.” His forehead meets the heel of his hand. “…You mean he doesn’t, er, come to you anymore? He and I never really discussed it…”

Isabela chuckles quietly with her words. “What? You haven’t noticed how one track minded he gets when he’s set his mind to something? Couldn’t just complain about mages, had to bed one too.” She props her chin in one hand. “I don’t think he’s really into women, anyway. Just had something to prove, I guess…”

Isabela raises an eyebrow quizzically. “Of course, why wouldn’t I be?” The reaction seems a bit forced, but it’s hard to tell if it is or if it’s just Isabela’s usual way of talking so casually about everything. “And you haven’t told me about how he pounds you into the bed yet. Don’t leave out the details.”

“Because you cared about him and he never figured it out.” Anders sighs and lowers his head, pushing back the stray wisps of hair that have come loose. It’s something in her tone, something in things he can remember her saying, laughing off, even in the recent past. And something in the way Justice is suddenly paying attention, when Isabela usually would make him turn away in irritation and disgust.

Ah, it didn’t occur to you that men might do her wrong?  
She fairly invites it… and yet…  
It’s no excuse, they harmonize.  
She hides love behind lust, like a dirty secret. Because she thinks she doesn’t deserve it.  
And selfishly, everyone lets her. Lets her use them to hurt her, holding their self-indulgence like a blade she throws herself upon.  
She hurts…

“You know, you need to admit it hurts before it can heal,” Anders adds after a moment.

Isabela nearly chokes on her ale, and shoots him a bit of a defensive look. After a couple moments she rolls her eyes away to glare at nothing in particular, resolutely refusing to be vulnerable even in the middle of small confessions. “/Alright/, alright. I had a thing for him. He needs to lighten up a little, but he’s nice enough when you’re not a mage. Like I said, I don’t think he’s into women all that much. Not a big deal.” She takes a heavy swig from her ale. “Not like you can talk, have you tried getting a word in edgewise or is this more a physical thing?” Not that physical things are bad.

“It is, a bit. It is a -bit- of a deal.” Anders frowns. “Because you’ve been a good friend to us both, and probably a better friend to /him/ than he realizes.” He shakes his head then, left wondering what he can do about it, if anything. Anything but just let it go without even being acknowledged. It isn’t -right-… she let herself suffer so she could do right by Fenris, and by him. “I won’t forget that.”

Isabela tsks. “I’m alright. Really.” While she doesn’t seem entirely convinced of it, she doesn’t sound completely broken either. “I’ve left worse. But you could /really/ make it better with details, if you would just spill already. Can’t you tell I’m living vicariously?”

Anders finally can’t help cracking a smile, a puff of air passing his lips. “Fine. He pounds like nobody I’ve ever had and I’m not going to be surprised if he breaks the bedframe soon. But as physical it is, it’s also a good deal more.” His expression sobers again, but while he’s earnest now, Anders doesn’t seem unhappy. Quietly amazed by the situation he’s found himself in, and certainly not unhappy. “I don’t think I could bear to lose him. I don’t think I could ever turn my back. We need one another. We still fight, but sometimes it’s as if we cut each other to the quick to find where the pain comes from. And then… he’s like a balm on my spirit.”

“I was hoping for more details about his dick, and here you are getting cute like bunnies and kittens again.” Isabela smiles at that. A real, true smile not disguised behind humor or a fit of chuckling over sex talk. “I’m glad you got him if someone had to. Just… just don’t pay much attention to his outbursts and do him some good. He doesn’t mean half of what he says.” She trails off and facepalms. “Maker, you’ve made me pull that ‘don’t you hurt him’ line…”

“I realized that after the first night. He struck up this argument with me that made no sense at all, he just.. has so much anger inside and no idea what to do with it. So I kissed him.” Anders smiles back. “It worked out well.” Anders realizes that he has his own fits to be talked down from, tricks Fenris has picked up that bring him back from those episodes.

“If that ever doesn’t work, you can just ride it out you know. Maker knows I’ve sat here for a few minutes until he’s just realized he’s being ridiculous again.” Isabela takes another drink at that, an edge uncomfortable with how close to home she’s allowing this to get. “It’s a bit of a game, he has to have someone throw the ball back to keep going. 'Swhy both of you are so great at arguments, you just keep trying to reason with him.”

“To just dismiss him would be rude,” Anders says. For all the wryness in his voice, that is genuinely how he’s always felt. that kind of blowing-off is for people whose opinions don’t matter. And Fenris’s mattered. “I really should have thought of that…. he’s just been under my skin from the day we chased off the slavers for him.” 

Isabela wags a finger through the air. “Oh, I wouldn’t call it dismissing. More like teaching him some manners. As nice as outbursts make him in bed, it could get him killed someday.” She goes quiet a moment as she takes a drink, then turns to regard Anders a bit more seriously. “By the way, I’ve been meaning to ask, but you can’t take this the wrong way…”

Anders cants his head slightly, meeting Isabela’s gaze. “Your advice has been priceless so far, so you can believe I’ll be taking it. And what is it?”

Isabela laughs. “As priceless as two bits, I’m sure.” She quiets down and composes herself, and honestly debate whether to say anything, especially now since it’s out that she had a thing for the damn elf. “Just make sure he’s not in this for the wrong reasons, alright?”

Anders gives a very sober nod, even as a chill settles in him. “The wrong reasons? What would those be?”

“Just… you know. A slave from a nation of mages, and the first thing he runs to with his freedom…but, sorry.” Isabela waves her hand. “I’m sure it’s nothing and I’m just being inappropriate. Noooot the first time. Always the helper.”

“You think he would want that? That he doesn’t know what to do but recreate old patterns?” Anders is actually considering that, serious, his gaze dropping to the surface of the table. “It might be true in part. But even if I am a Mage, I’m not like Danarius. I’m not a sadist, and I don’t dominate him. That at least I try to be very conscious of. I think freedom frightens him. He tells me that nothing in Kirkwall feels familiar.”

“I’m just wondering if it really helps him or changes anything to be a crutch like that-” Isabela stops herself short and waves a hand. “I’m not saying leave him. Just be sure he makes his own choices. Worst comes to worst, it would be hot to be his new master at.. /everything/.”

Anders nods again, not offended, but obviously taking this seriously. “I will do my best. It’s more important to me to do right by him than just have incredibly proficient sex, but if possible I’d like both.” The fact that Isabela is showing a great deal of insight and sensitivity to Fenris and his emotional baggage doesn’t go unnoticed. Anders half-rises from the bench, putting a hand gently on the small of Isabela’s back and leaning in to kiss her cheek. “If you ever think I’m not… that I’m stifling him or letting him retreat too far… I’m glad you’ll tell me.” He swings his leg over the bench, straightening and drawing his cloak around him. “I should go get supper on the stove. I’ll tell Fenris you said hello.”

Isabela drops her chin to the edge of one palm and waves him away like some pesky gnat. “Supper! Go on, you little housewife, before I drag you away all for myself.”


	15. Chapter 15

Honestly, Fenris didn’t mind the silence in the mansion when Anders left. He hadn’t particularly missed it, per se, but it was welcome all the same when the only thing he could hear was the quiet stirrings of people outside. From deep within the mansion, they sounded like ants. It was relaxing, when he could turn his head to any direction and know nothing in the emptiness moved save dust and himself, invisible unless a few rays of errant sunlight filtered in from the windows and exposed them.

**

 

Fenris stops instinctively at the sound before just continuing to use the soap to scrub the dirt and a speck or two of missed dried blood off of himself. He isn’t romantic enough to pretend he knows what Anders’ footsteps sound like yet, but if it isn’t the mage then he doesn’t feel particularly intimidated by a single person trying to go steal some books. If it’s not him… well, nothing’s ever prevented him from hurting people while naked. If it is, being naked is just fine then anyway.

A few moments pass and then those footsteps make their way upstairs. Anders steps into the bedroom first, kicking off his boots and stripping out of his coat and his tunic. He can hear the watery sounds coming from the bathroom so makes the safe assumption that Fenris is there… but the logical follow-up to that thought is the mental image of Fenris, bathing. That’s a very -good- mental image, one he’d like to see with more than just his mind’s eye, and he hurries his pace a bit, slipping into the bathroom with a leather-cased shaving kit in one hand.

There’s something oddly comfortable about being able to casually keep rubbing a bar of soap along one’s shin while a second person comes into the bathroom. Fenris isn’t used to it, but this decidedly feels good, just coexisting and too busy bathing to try keeping up any sort of appearances. Which sounds.. completely daft. So he remains silent about it, soap moving over his foot until he notices the case. “Experiments in the bathroom?” There’s a kitchen for that, you know.

Anders is a bit thrown by that. Once he’s able to actually look at Fenris’s eyes, though, he sees them pointing to the shaving kit in his hand. He half-tosses the leather case onto the counter by the wash basin and lunges down, hands braced on the edge of the tub as he steals a kiss. Appearances or not, with his hair wetted down all the perfect angles of Fenris’s face are clear to see, and his eyes seem so large Anders could drown in them. “It’s for shaving, love. I don’t know if you’ve seen many Anders but if I don’t do something about it regularly, I’d end up looking like a dwarf on stilts.”

Fenris catches the edge of the stone basin in surprise, a quick splash of water dashing onto the floor and the soap dropped into the water. Not that he moves away when their lips meet, and he uses his newfound leverage to push back into the kiss. When they part, he can’t help but smirk. “I assumed you were naturally short haired.”

Anders laughs at that. "If only. Last time I was in solitary I escaped by braiding a rope from my own beard, you know.“ He playfully scrubs his chin against Fenris’s face before he straightens up again, grinning. One last slow perusing look at the bathing elf, and Anders turns back to the washbasin, pumping in some water and flipping open his shaving case. He takes out a soft brush and starts whipping up a lather of shaving foam. "Anything else you’d like me to shave while I’m at it?”

Well there’s only one other place that really has any hair besides the man’s face. “It’s perfect.” Fenris says it without thinking and nearly chokes when his mind catches up with his words, and he adds after the small pause, “-ly fine, I’m not sure why you’re worried about it.” Not even that save was good enough, and he’s quick to turn away, picking the soap from the bath to store it and pick up the stone from the nearby nook that he set there.

Anders glances back over his shoulder, eyebrows lifted, then looks down at his own stomach, and where the strip of hair below his navel vanishes below the waist of his trousers. He’d assumed that Fenris, being an elf, might want his lover to be more smooth. For the first time he looks at his ‘happy trail’ as if it’s something novel and sensual. When he’d been with Karl he’d thought of his gradually spreading body hair as something that marred the smooth, soft, boyish perfection that Karl had quietly praised in him. He begins to mop his face with shaving lather, taking another glance at Fenris in the bath. "Why do you have rocks in the bath?“

"What?” Fenris momentarily forgets the fact that he’d nearly been caught blushing with no hair to hide behind, looking back and pausing over the white lather covering Anders’ face. It takes him a moment, but he realizes the truth of it with a small frown of disdain. “Of course you wouldn’t know what this is. You put your feet in shoes.” He decides to ignore any further human brand nonsense for now as he shifts his hips, draws up a knee and with an easy flexibility props his opposite ankle atop it. The bottom of his foot doesn’t look horribly alien but the arches between the pads rise noticably higher, the callouses thicker from walking barefoot his whole life, and with an odd attention he starts scraping along the back edge of his heel.

Anders finishes lathering his face and stops, watching curiously, even leaning over to get a better look. Fenris’s feet are almost dainty, and certainly as graceful as the rest of him. Feet have never been a particular fetish of his, but that could change. Unable to say much with shaving lather covering his lips, he moves back to the wash basin and flips open a wooden-handled straight razor. Lifting up his chin until his throat is taut, he begins scraping away stubble and foam with the razor’s edge.

Fenris can’t help himself but slow his movements and look over. Something can be said for the simplicity of rock to foot, and seems that shaving is it’s own little ritual he never even knew existed. Danarius sure had never shaved, just snipped things into an acceptable shape once in a blue moon and moved on, more worried about the neatly slicked back hair on his head by far. He takes a few more moments to watch before the pressure of his ankle digging into his knee starts to bother. The work starts again in earnest, careful to take all the rough edges and leave smooth padding behind. “It’s a miracle you don’t slice your neck open.”

Anders makes a valiant attempt to say “I’m just that good” without moving his lips at all. His eyes have that glimmer in them that clearly suggests a smirk,, even with his mouth lost under all that lather. Once his throat is bare, and freshly shaven there’s barely even a shadow of a beard left on it, he gives his razor a quick rinse and begins scraping away at his cheeks and jaw.

Fenris’ eyes flick up at Anders’ great attempt but just shakes his head and gets back to work, in one fluid movement switching his legs to prop the other foot. Even from Anders’ distance it’s so much more obvious from this angle how the stirrup of his pants are supposed to work, the dip of vulnerable skin before the heel for more pronounced.  
And he really can’t help himself, even if Anders can’t really respond at the moment. Or maybe for that very reason. “You can’t just /magic/ it off?”

Anders scrapes at his chin and gives Fenris a narrow-eyed look. He recognizes he’s being teased and decides to humor Fenris with a one-fingered salute. He gets back to his shaving, closing in on his lips and chin. Though as an afterthought, he leans and cranes his neck, rather liking the position Fenris’s strange foot-polishing rite puts his legs in, and the little hint of scrotum he can see if he gets a good angle.

Fenris just smirks at the mage’s response as he sets down the rock and pulls his toes back, flexing and stretching some tendon deep inside his leanly muscled leg that had been threatening him with a cramp earlier. “I see. Too busy being a victim to act like you’re better than everyone else.” It’s a bit sharp for a playful jab but he doesn’t apologize for it, and reaches for a towel to dry off as he gets up and out of the bath, floor cold and slick against his momentarily vulnerable feet.

Anders finally finishes his shave, splashing his face with alcohol and then rinsing and toweling off. he looks younger without the usual crop of three-day beard, and his skin is fair and smooth, the line of his jaw rather fine. “Don’t talk about yourself that way, Elf,” Anders jibes. He turns to watch Fenris, breathing out his craving in a sigh. 

Fenris raises an eyebrow at that, but the expression is almost immediately covered as he throws the towel over his head to dry off his hair. The towel slides down to cover his back and his hair is left wet but generally back in place, the clear view of his defined profile lost entirely. “How would I be better than everyone else?” Other than being able to wield a slightly larger sword than everyone else.

Anders’s thoughts derail as his gaze wanders down. he curls his hands into loose fists at his sides, to keep himself from trying to grope something. “One could start with the fact that you’re bloody /beautiful/…” There’s an edge to his voice, a breathless and lustful growl. “Bedroom, please. /Quickly/ please…”

Fenris steps forward, the fact that the rest of his body is still a bit wet momentarily forgotten, and raises his hands to run his fingers along the fresh shave as he pulls Anders into a horribly short kiss. “Stop lying. I’ve mentioned flattery, I won’t repeat it.”

“I’m not lying,” Anders says, the lust in his voice frustrated and turned to confusion. His brows knit together as he looks slightly down at Fenris, but he already knows he won’t find a single flaw in what he sees. He reaches for Fenris’s towel, gathering it gently and insistently into his fists and using the fabric to pull Fenris up close. “Why do you think I’m lying?”

 

“I won’t-” Fenris turns his head aside as he cuts himself off. Clearly Anders does need the obvious stated or this wouldn’t be an issue. But making him actually say it forces the words to come out incredibly irritated. “Because I’m not. Simple enough.”

Anders’s confusion turns into to outright disbelief. “You… actually /believe/ that? Have you even /seen/ yourself? Looked in a mirror?” He would moderate his tone, normally, but he can’t keep the incredulity out of his voice. He sounds as if somebody told him that the stated purpose of the Templar order was to make sure every mage got three servings a day of milk and cookies. Mouth open, he shakes his head. “You ever notice how absolutely every woman in the Dalish camp comes out to the main bonfire when you’re visiting? It’s not Hawke they’re checking out and it’s -certainly- not me.”

“Yes, perish the thought of an elf finding you attractive.” But for the small humor Fenris pulls out of Anders’ grasp, predictably not all in the mood for going over all his flaws, supposed or otherwise. “I believe what is true. Everything about me is wrong.” He turns to stalk back into the bedroom and pull his clothes on, or at least his underclothes.  
So Isabela wasn’t kidding when she said to only compliment his eyes and dick…

Anders tries to keep his makeshift hold on Fenris, but when he actually moves like he means it, he lets him go. Only to storm after him, feeling a familiar surge of anger. “Oh no, I am NOT letting this one go.” He kicks the bedroom door shut and moves into the room, certain to keep himself between the Fenris and the door. “"I admit you can accuse me of being biased because I love you. But I have not been /flattering/ you or /lying/ to you or trying to butter you up in hopes of getting laid. Where in the Maker’s Creation do you get off saying that I am?! Is that what this has been to you? Is that what you see when I’m looking at you? Do I fuck you like I’m thinking ‘At least he’s better than my own hand?’” Anders’s voice is steadily rising. “I may not compare all that well to having Isabela, but I did my damnedest to give you all that I had, and it’s THAT … lackluster? You had me begging and it comes across as lukewarm?!”

Fenris’ agitation builds visibly though Anders’ words, and barely makes it to the end before replying. “festis bei uo canavarum… /FINE!/” His energy practically explodes at that, harshly flashing the emphasis, and he waves a hand. “Where should I start, since you want things spelled out?! That I’m too tall for any other elf, but I’m still short and thin for the rest of your lot? That I’m completely covered in these scars, that it destroyed my voice, or that my hair will never be.. whatever color it had been? Isn’t it just /beautiful/ that I don’t even know?  
"Don’t make this about you, mage. You have excuses from being in a Circle for so long to plain bad taste. This isn’t about how much you love me.”

“Then if it’s about the bloody TRUTH instead you can STILL shut up and listen to what I have to say!” Anders closes upon Fenris, hands raised for a moment in a frustrated wish to grab the elf by the arms and shake him. “You…” He gestures at Fenris as he lowers his hands again. “What you think of as too tall and too thin? To the rest of the world it looks like the embodiment of grace. You’re not scrawny, you’re lean, lithe as an acrobat. Even your 'scars’ are graceful, they follow the contours of your muscles and tendons instead of breaking and defying the beauty that was already there. Your skin is like caramel, your hair is like moonlight, your eyes are solid emerald, the shape of your lips has made me want to kiss you even when you looked ready to spit at me, the sound of your voice makes everything you say sound a half-step removed from poetry, and there is not a single part of you that doesn’t make me stop and look and ache and crave, from the tips of your ears to the arches of your feet, and seeing you in motion is enough to make me believe there IS a Maker.”

Fenris goes a bit quiet at that in the midst of his anger. Even if Anders is completely off his rocker, it throws him totally by surprise to have this many compliments thrust upon him. “I..” He looks down, deliberate as he recomposes his shattered mess of thoughts. “I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that they wanted to 'add to me’. But if a word of it is even true,” Which really, he still doesn’t much feel like something Anders just described, but for the sake of humoring him, “- then I’m supposed to be grateful for these, then? Knowing that anyone wants me for that makes it worse, like some slime covering me that I can’t get rid of.”

“I hardly said that,” Anders says, his tone level now that he’s managed to give vent to the initial rush of fury and passion. “But you could look at them in a different light. They don’t make you abhorrent. They didn’t ruin you. And you have been and always will be more than just what has been done to you. And I can’t imagine anyone wanting you only for your marks… you wear them, not the other way around.”

“You can imagine or not as you want.” Fenris’ voice raises again, though less sudden rage and more bitterness fills his words. “Do you think Danarius has chased me all this time just to find /me/? They could easily find someone else, but they don’t. The only thing that matters to them are my veins, and they would have cut them out by now if that would work.”

“I don’t like to make speculations about what sadists might be thinking or why,” Anders says with grim seriousness in his voice. He sits down on the edge of the bed, looking up at Fenris calmly. “But sometimes I can’t avoid thinking that it -is- you he keeps trying to retrieve.” He has a knowing look in his eyes, something that says he does recognize the implications of what both of them seem to be hedging around. He wonders if it’s true, and if it’s violation that has left Fenris feeling as if all that he is has been spoiled.

Fenris still doesn’t meet Anders’ gaze directly for any seconds long enough to notice the recognition. But he’s tired of throwing this argument back in spinning circles around the real issue, and without any coaxing he sits at the mage’s side. He draws his knee up to prop his arm and cradle his face against a palm. “Shut up.”

Anders does. He watches Fenris, listens to the sound of his breathing, and stays where he is, hands in in his lap. He feels the impulse to lean against Fenris but he doesn’t – Fenris knows he’s there, if he needs touch.

It takes some silence for the elf’s breathing to slow from it’s overwhelmed pace. At length Anders’ words finally sink in, and for all that it was horribly untrue and embarrassing, it was what the mage felt. It didn’t matter what the truth was or whatever anyone else thought it was. The rest was just so unimportant. He lifts his forehead away from his hand just far enough to bring it to rest at the other man’s shoulder. “You didn’t deserve all of that.” But then, when does Anders actually deserve Fenris yelling.

Anders turns his head. His nod brushes his bare chin against Fenris’s scalp. Remembering Isabela’s advice helps: Fenris’s anger and bitterness is a storm to be weathered. "No, and I don’t concede my point either.“ His voice is very soft. "I am right here, if you need me.”

Fenris huffs the weakest silent chuckle through his nose, though mostly to himself. So many sodding years later and he has yet to fully grasp the Qun, and here it is staring him in the face in the form of a damn mage. Struggling changes nothing. He pulls away from Anders’ shoulder with a quick glance away, lest he linger there too long. “I know.”


	16. Chapter 16

“Nice day for a picnic, isn’t it?” Garrett Hawke gazes up at the typically overcast and brooding sky that hangs ominously low over the Sundermount foothills, whistling a stridently jaunty tune. And he is, in fact, carrying a picnic basket, lovingly packed by Orana, including a couple favorites for everyone in the small party: Garrett himself, Aveline, Fenris, and Anders. As well as some treats earmarked for the workers at the Bone Pit mines, where they’re headed today. Garrett hasn’t received a status report from the mining operation in over a week, and given the history of the place to say that bodes ill is an understatement. But packing the picnic basket seemed like a suitably wry way of looking on the bright side, even if it required a metaphorical bucket of yellow paint for there even to BE a bright side.

 

“Clever, Hawke,” Anders says. “If it does rain, we can be happy that it will be harder for dragons to light us on fire. And if it doesn’t, we can be happy it won’t soak our sandwiches.” He rolls his eyes and shakes his head.

The group rounds the hill that opens up to the top of the cliffs surrounding the pit, and Fenris can already begin to smell the dust. There’s a very specific smell to bones, one he wouldn’t be able to describe if asked, and every time they come here it hits him and reminds him of Tevinter and what happened here before he has a chance to fend off the thought. Predictably it leaves him on edge, though that’s probably a good trait where there are dragons. “Yes, because you all can manage to be happy here. And why am I, again?”  
Aveline walks last among them with her large shield to her back, and hushes the elf’s grumbling comment. “Because you have the biggest sword and no sense of self preservation. Which is why Anders is here, I imagine.”

“You’re both here because a week’s vacation is long enough. I don’t want you getting out of condition.” Garrett’s voice is suddenly stern as he glances back over his shoulder. So far he’s content, however, that he’s not going to have to think of a way to get Anders to run laps. He’d heard the mage was eating better, but it seemed to be giving him some additional vigor rather than fattening him. “Although Isabela assures me you’ve been giving eachother plenty of exercise.” A veiled smirk, and an arch tone far more typical of the swarthy rogue.  
“Oh and naturally you look at the mage. You forget I hike up every stair between the undercity and Hightown twice a day, never mind what Fenris does to keep me limber.” Anders’ retort is very clearly nonplussed.

Fenris manages to look impervious to the commentary about them, as if it wasn’t said in the first place. “He’s making sure you can run when waving your stick around is inevitably pointless against dragons, mage.”  
Aveline speeds up enough to catch up with the elf, coming along the opposite side Anders is on and actively debating whether to smack him or not for keeping up with that ‘mage’ nonsense when they’re supposedly fucking. For that matter, Aveline still wonders if there’s some vast joke, because they sure don’t seem to have changed much. “Oh hush, are you two ever going to be civil, or is that too much to- ” She stops short, making sure she’s seeing things correctly. Sure enough, on Fenris’ shoulder amongst the upswept cluster of spiked feathers, a couple sunbleached ones strike against the black. “Fenris!”  
Fenris nearly stops in place, still growly but decidedly quizzical at the sudden but small outburst. “What is it?”  
“/Nothing/, oh nothing at all. Anders, are you missing anything from your coat lately?”

“Not that I’d no–” Anders trails off as he turns to Aveline and then to Fenris, realizing what she was looking at. His cheeks bloom into a brilliant blush. “Fenris” he says, very quietly. “Hold still a moment, will you?” Garrett halts at that, half-turning with an eyebrow raised.

 

“We don’t have time for this.” Fenris shoots Anders with a warning glare as he reluctantly stops, but it’s short lived before he turns the look with a bit more accusation towards Aveline. She’s completely untouched by it, too busy touching a few fingers to her lips and trying not to giggle. Fenris and cute don’t go together, but here it is plain as day. “I’m sorry I said anything, but he was going to notice. Might as well be now, right?”

Anders steps up to Fenris, looking him in the eyes with remarkable intensity. He leans into bring his lips to Fenris’s mouth, his arms coming up around his back, though his wrists are bent, his hands kept away. But there’s enough of an embrace hovering behind Fenris that he’d actually have to use some force if he wishes to pull away. Acknowledging that tacit act of sweetness is important enough to Anders to force things a bit.  
Garrett turns the rest of the way, his other eyebrow lifting to join the first one. He grins, his teeth a white slash framed by his dark beard. “I beg to differ. There’s -always- time for a proper snog. Take as long as you need, Anders.”

Aveline smiles broadly as she takes a few more steps up the path closer to Hawke, to properly give them space. “You know if someone told me this was going to happen a few years ago, I would have laughed so hard.”  
Fenris doesn’t immediately respond, torn between duty to keep following Hawke for their serious business or fall into the kiss. But it’s not like he’s shoving the mage off. It’s only when he overhears Hawke’s comment that he finally presses back. His mouth parts, tip of his tongue grazing quickly over the front of the mage’s bottom lip, as his hands settle comfortably high along Anders’ waist, the tips of his thumb gauntlets hooking along his beltloops. If Hawke says go for it, might as well not complain.

Anders’s hands-free hug grows comfortably tight around Fenris. His lips part to let Fenris’s tongue slip past, and his own moves against it. The kiss deepens, leisurely and warm, Anders oblivious to onlookers until he realizes he’s growing short of breath, and his trousers feel tight. Thank goodness for robes. Before he lets Fenris go he leans in close to his ear: “More when we get home, Amor meum,” he whispers.  
Anders finally steps away looking dreamily satisfied and shamelessly besotted, leading Garrett to give Aveline a friendly punch in the arm to state his agreement. “Bravo, you two, bravo! I don’t know about you, Aveline, but that’s going to be keeping me warm tonight,” he teases.

Aveline laughs outright. Sure she’d heard, but she hadn’t really seen them actively romantic in any form. Nothing had really outwardly changed, maybe they walked an inch closer, but they still bickered like children. This was… well, quite a drastic difference “I think I’m too shocked for even that.”  
He’d never outright forgotten them there but as Anders steps away Fenris averts his eyes downward. Not blushing awkwardly yet, but he feels he might if he actually sees the others. “Let’s move on.”

“Right. We’re probably better off focusing on the task at hand.” Anders stands up straight and tries to discretely adjust his pants. Not good enough to fool Hawke, who gives him a quick eyes-dowm smirk before he turns and leads on again.  
“You two should be glad to know, by the way, that the deed to the manor is in its final stages of approval. I may have to lean on Seneschal Brann a bit, but you know how much I love doing that anyway. I think I might pay Jethann to make a house-call on him, he’s a lot more pliable after a good boning. Probably helps to work loose that rod up his arse.”

Fenris doesn’t really respond to that, like a proper seemingly ungrateful ass. But to be 'fair’ he doesn’t seem to be suffering the way Anders is. Pretty clearly not, in fact, without much of anything to hide under. Equal opportunity cold shoulder that just comes so easily.  
Aveline drops back behind them again as they move again, not surprised in the least that the elf is silent. “I’m sure our favorite whore would do it for free if she got to see what we just did.”

“Isabela is not a whore!” The words come out of Anders’s mouth, so vehement that they clearly surprise even him. Hello, Justice, he thinks to himself, but while inclined to be moderate, he does agree with the sentiment. “She’s a good friend, Aveline. Please don’t speak of her that way in front of me.” Anders tone is milder, not as castigating as the initial outburst.  
As for Garrett, he pointedly refuses to turn around and even acknowledge the exchange. He doesn’t want to think about Isabela right now. He’s been trying not to since the night she walked out on him.

Even Fenris startles a bit at the outburst, raising his eyebrow notably when Anders sinks back into the dominant consciousness, and while his words are for one moreso than the other, it would seem more awkward to address Justice with others around, when he might not answer so easily this time. “You sound… committed.”  
Aveline chuckles behind them, not sounding too intimidated. She’s surprised, sure, but with the amount of 'helping people’ she does with her job, she feels some silent quota has likely been achieved that would keep Justice from immediately attacking outright, especially over something so petty. “Being friends isn’t going to change what someone is. I’ll stop calling her a whore, when she stops calling me man hands. Sound like a deal?”

“No.” Justice again, from the hardness of it. “She insults your hands, you insult her whole nature. And she is -not- a whore.” It’s much harder to rein Justice in when he agrees with him. If anything they have an unhealthy tendency to egg eachother on. “And you have to admit, your hands -are- a bit masculine.” Anders, gazing innocently skywards. “I’m -just saying.-”

“I swear Anders if you don’t stay out of this, I will break you. And you!” Aveline jabs a finger accusingly at.. well, Anders, because there’s nowhere else to point at. “So you want to answer what 'big girl’ means, then? If you even start…”

“It’s not necessarily an insult to make observation of the fact that you’re built like a brick shithouse. given how much stock you put in physical hardiness, -soldier-, I’m surprised you don’t take it as a compliment. What would you rather, we all treat you as a delicate, wilting flower of femininity? When none of us has even been able to imagine you in a dress, much less seen you wear one. You and Donnic were bloody -married- in your G-”  
“I’d thank you to shut the fuck up now, Anders,” Garret rumbles over his shoulder.

“Oh that cuts it, I’ll just kill you both and be done with it!” Aveline takes a few blazingly angry steps forward, fully intending to land something metal against the mage’s face. As she passes Fenris reaches out to catch the back of her armor, halting the small stampede and catching her instinctively thrown fist as it swings backwards towards him in his free hand. Even knowing why he’s able to do it, the sight of him stopping the comparatively bullish Aveline is almost as comical as it is impressive. He shoots a sharp glare in Anders’ direction, on good terms with both women but Aveline is the one that’s here. “Isabela can fight her own battles, mage. Remind her that you’re an idiot before I let her kill you.”

Anders actually backs away when Aveline changes him, his arms coming up to try and shelter his face from the punch that doesn’t come. Something of a reflex when somebody wearing plate armor gets pissed at him – he doesn’t even reach for his magic. When Fenris growls at him, he straightens again, looking genuinely reproachful. “I’m sorry, Aveline. I’m sorry, Fenris.”  
“What about me?!” Hawke demands.  
Anders, for once, ignores him.

“I’ll take care of him.” It probably comes off darker than Fenris initially intended but the end result is the same; as he releases his grip Aveline is still bloody pissed but she stays put. In her place Fenris closes the distance between them and grabs a fistful of the mage’s coat to pull him forward. The bad part about being together is he no longer feels the need to keep his distance when he’s angry. But he pauses before he even starts in earnest, casting a glance towards Hawke and knowing they all wasted time enough already, and he gruffly shoves Anders back again as he turns to keep going, whether Hawke decides to start leading them again or not.

Anders stumbles back when Fenris shoves him away, saying nothing, doing nothing, to resist. He holds his tongue, picking up his pace to keep up with the rest. Just heal them, you stupid mage, he tells himself. No one cares what you think. If they did the Gallows would be empty by now. After all… all you are is your magic, and they’ll turn you over to the Templars the minute you’re more trouble than your power is worth. Stupid mage, stupid…

Fenris’ forward march doesn’t go far, coming to a dead halt at the top of the hill. Without the clouds overhead the white pit below immediately threatens to blind him, but he doesn’t look away. It would be weak to, with the reminder of what Tevinter has done staring him down. The air is dusty, smells a bit distantly of burnt flesh, but it’s just from the dried bones crumbling against each other.

The Bone Pit is predictably deserted, and in the distance the squalling cries of young dragons can be heard. Anders remains silent, though Hawke is soon striking up a conversation with Aveline, something about a discussion he’d had with Donnic about Carta fighting tactics and a few things the Guard recruits might benefit from during training. Even with his head down and filled with nothing but a torrent of self-recriminations, Anders keeps an eye on Fenris wherever he goes.  
Hawke beckons, and he follows as the march moves on to the mines. “Let’s sweep the place clean,” Hawke instructs, wrinkling his nose at the rotting-meat and fresh-fewmetts smell wafting from the entrance to mine. “Keep an eye out for anything Solivitus might like. And get out of your damned funk, Anders, if anyone falls today I’m done with you and nigh bottomless well of mad bullshit.” The rebuke stings, but it brings some cold fire to Anders’s eyes.


	17. Chapter 17

The evening sun is already growing heavy on the horizon when the group splits up to drag themselves home. Hightown’s buildings cast long shadows, toned blue-grey from the stone the city is made of, with strikingly vibrant strips of oranges from the sunset. A few red flags get caught in one of these patches of light and bathes the surrounding stone in a red fire glow. Lowtown has already fallen into shadow, cast in the deeper tones of nightfall, and small yellow lights beginning to dot the carved landscape, interrupted by the already-bright glow of the factory. Farther off the twin statues catch the light, their metal surface blinding and details obscured until they look more akin to torches than what they’re supposed to represent. Even the gallows, it’s shape a dark silhouette as it feels the oncoming night the soonest, lights scattering across and tripled along the water isolating it from the city.  
Kirkwall has always felt oppressive, but it’s these bare minutes each day when the city could be considered beautiful in it’s own right.  
A pity the elf doesn’t seem to notice. Fenris had been relatively quiet the rest of the journey through the mines and trek back home. At least he seemed civil, if silently moody. What else is new, and nobody else seemed to notice any difference.  
Once the door to the mansion closes behind them, completely dark when they haven’t been there since early this morning, Fenris turns and knocks his arm against Anders’ chest to pin him to the nearest wall. “/Why/?”

Anders stumbles back. Regardless of being bone-weary from overexerting himself in the mines, between anger and frustration and the need to prove himself over again, he’s not inclined to fight back. And Fenris’s strength is still surprising, overwhelming. He bows his head, looking at the arm across his chest. "Here I thought standing up for a friend was noble.“

Fenris’ arm gradually loosens, still unyielding but not actively trying to dig a gauntlet into the mage’s coat, either. "You realize you called the woman that helped arrange paperwork for this mansion a shithouse.”

Anders glances away, hanging his head. "And I apologized. I got carried away.“

Fenris doesn’t seem very impressed with that response, but drops his arm. Well seems as far as one can see his features in the dimly lit space, though the nearby windows manage to catch little pinpoints against his eyes. "There is no /justice/ when you cause more damage than what you save.” While Aveline can try to point at the spirit hiding inside the man, Fenris’ words always aim sharp enough to blow past Anders and right to the demon’s heart.

“What damage? Since when did anyone give two tugs of a dead dog’s dick what I think?” Anders scoffs. The barb aimed for Justice misses its mark, Anders preferring to take responsibility for pushing things too far with his perverse urges to do whatever it takes to set people off. "I asked her ‘please’ if I recall. 'Please don’t insult my friend in front of my face’ and she laughed me off. If she cares that little what I think I don’t think anything I have to say could possibly hurt -her- feelings.“

"They’ve called each other names for years. But why you think nobody cares what you say is a mystery to me.” Fenris turns away to pull out a candle in the damn place already. He’s admittedly disappointed that the arrow fell so far from it’s mark and goes for the more direct approach, easier when he’s not looking at Anders. “Why am I even bothering, you didn’t cause this.”

“What, the crazy mage, the abomination and general failure at life who’s notably even worse at cards? Other than you and Varric, no one seeks me out unless they need healing. It’s all I’m good for.” Cautiously, Anders follows a couple of paces behind Fenris. "I did… I let it go too far. Fenris, I -am- sorry.“

"Nobody seeks you out because your clinic is in an unfortunate place. They might have tried now, but you’re here. Under the only roof in Hightown anyone would hesitate to enter. Nobody hates you save me.” Fenris doesn’t sound bitter about that, it’s a simple truth that he’s being an irritable hermit amongst socialites and he couldn’t be more content about it. He stops and half turns back as he hears Anders come closer, half expecting a touch out of the movement. “You didn’t start this. He did. You’ve been together long enough I can’t doubt that he knew exactly what he was doing.”

That does give Anders pause, his face perplexed, then grim as he realizes it’s true. And his grim look gradually changes to horror as he realizes why Justice did it. He brings his fists to his temples, closing his fingers around his hair until the pain grows sharp, needing to keep a grip on something to keep himself from screaming. "/Fuck…/“ He says hoarsely. "I’m a mess inside… a raw and bloody mess…”

Fenris reaches forward to catch Anders’ wrist firmly in an attempt to similarly capture his attention before the mage really hurts himself, but doesn’t outright stop him. What would be the alternative, cling nails into the elf instead? Not exactly an option he would volunteer for, no matter how much he wishes he could offer it. “What is it?” Because he sure as bloody hell doesn’t understand why Justice would do this.

“That… Isabela deserved having a friend who cared enough to hurt on her behalf. That she’d gone out of her way to help me understand you, even though it hurt her, and it didn’t seem fair…” Anders shakes his head, his grip loosening, hands lowering slowly. "..And that if someone had to balance that with pain it might as well be me. He turned me loose, to hurt myself.“

Fenris lets Anders’ hand slide away, his palm brushing over the skin as it passes underneath until it coasts to a stop amongst the mess of hair. There’s so many questions raised to that response, he doesn’t know where to start. He does know to start feeling livid at the demon though, and frustration immediately screams in his head when he can’t just take Justice aside to beat him for this. "What do you mean, it hurt her? What did?”

“…losing you. That, and how it must feel to put up this front for the world and have everyone treat her like there’s nothing underneath, nothing more. But… she did care for you.” Anders still looks troubled, clearly troubled. This is just another sign of how badly things went wrong. When he’d accepted Justice’s offer he’d thought Justice might be like having a close, dear friend. Over the time they had fought together in Amaranthine he’d learned to trust the spirit with his life. But now, having access to a complete map of every open wound on his spirit, every deep gash of self-loathing and guilt, Justice was willing to exploit them if it seemed righteous to do so.

“I didn’t…” Fenris looks down as he parses this information, but sets it aside before it overwhelms him. “I’ll talk to her later.” He raises his head again, enough to glare his disgusted rage, chained down by the fact that he can’t hurt the mage over this. “Stop hiding behind your victims, /demon/.”

Anders bows his head. The lyrium haze that overtakes the surface of his eyes looks dimmer than usual. "I am here, Fenris,“ comes that harsher, hollower voice as Justice moves to the forefront of Anders’ mind. "And I have heard your rebukes.”

“You haven’t heard half of them.” Fenris’ hand snaps to the front of Anders’ coat, and with a hard shove keeps the possessed mage at arm’s length. He won’t hurt the mage. But he might tear a few holes in his clothes from his vicelike grip. “You can justify all your reasons, but all I see is the destruction of the only people that may actually care about me. I will /not let you have them/!”

Justice looks down at the gauntleted hand grasping him by the front of his robes. He lifts his eyes again, slowly, looking Fenris in the face, studying the lines of anger etched there. The signs of pain. And on the other side of his eyes, he weathers the screaming, thrashing struggle of Anders to regain control, gone from merely uncomfortable with Justice’s presence to terrified, after that breach of trust. “I have done so much wrong in this world, trying to set it to rights. I have wronged you, and I have wronged Anders, who placed his life in my hands. I did so thoughtlessly, swept away in feelings and desires I have never known before. I prayed in my time that I might never know how a Spirit becomes a demon. But now… I know it too well, and I do not know what to do. My existence has been purity and certainty. But in this world I have had neither. The only remedy for what I have done and may yet do is death… but… it is not /right/ that Anders lose his life for what was simply a /mistake./” Justice’s frustration is plain in his voice.

All the emotions pent up and ricocheting in his mind set Fenris’ skin on fire, the room’s walls washed in slowly churning blues from the both of them, and cast light escapes as it can through the small entrance windows. “If you kill him, I will be sure you perish with him. Then I will kill every single woman and child I come across in your name, and leave their parents and lovers to spit on the ground as they curse you for taking away everything that made them whole.”

“No!” That…./hurts/. The thought that by trying to take his violence out of the world, even then he would only put more in it. The thought of Fenris, alone, lost to his own bitterness when Anders had wished only to heal him hurts just as intensely. And Anders rails against him. I promised not to leave him alone. I promised him I would stay! Justice surges forward, clamping his hands on Fenris’s biceps. “It shall not be! Anders swore an oath to stand by you and I will see him honor it. I will /help/ him honor it!” He shivers at the sound of Fenris’s lyrium, its song reaching to him, stirring him with intoxicating beauty… and a fresh rush of those strange desires his merge with Anders had given him. There is simply so much /there/… in the Fade it would have swam in the air between them, color and song, but in the mortal world all of it is within him, tangled and crying to escape. Justice falls to his knees. “I beseech your forgiveness. I beseech your /guidance/, Fenris, I am /LOST/.”

Fenris jerks back at the unexpected touch on him from both sides. His arm sparks and ignites like a small star then phases, the air hissing at the heat generated from forcibly slicing open the Fade and laying it bare to the open air like salt on a wound. Sense hits him fast enough to not reach forward and with all his will he remains still, the metal on the front of Anders’ jacket sizzling as his touch idles there, until Justice falls away from him. The moment the contact leaves him the lyrium dims, his arm most noticeable as it returns somewhat to normal and the sizzling flutters and dies out. “Defer to Anders. The moment you force him to suffer, you are an abomination that will be dealt with.”

Justice’s head drops forward, a silent space of seconds interrupted with a hitch and quiver in Anders’ breathing. Anders returns, shaking from the strain of too many tightly wound feelings, of his the panic of having been a prisoner in his own skin while Justice had spoken with Fenris, the stress it places on his physical body when Justice rides him that way, the electrical storm of Lyrium that had lit the room. All that, and the near exhaustion he’d already pushed himself too, take a hefty toll. When Anders struggles to stand again, he staggers and falls.

Fenris is silent as Anders recovers, feeling a small spike of guilt that he dragged Justice out when the mage was already beyond exhausted. As Anders falls he reaches out to catch him by the shoulders, supports the weight easily as he turns and takes Anders by the wrist to loop his arm across the elf’s shoulders while avoiding the greatsword he’s also carrying. He curls his free arm around Anders’ waist, and starts walking him to the bedroom. “I’m sorry.” Of course, his first reaction is to ask if Anders is okay, but they both know the answer to that.  
Anders is pallid and short of breath, cold sweat standing out on his skin. “I’m sorry-er,” Anders says, apparently still hale enough for sarcasm. He does his best to support himself, but he ends up leaning heavily against Fenris regardless. “I really am, though. So sorry…” He shakes his head slowly.

The want for nothing much else than to curl up and sleep, the both of them arranged very pointedly with Anders’ hands safely away from him so they can manage the same bed in peace, hits Fenris suddenly and unexpectedly. He turns his head as they slowly start up the stairs, and eventually to the bed. “Why?” Again, he never seems to understand what Anders is feeling punished for. “I said, you didn’t start this.”

“It’s bleeding over from him, I think… not that he’s doing it on purpose. It’s just how I am.” Anders does what he can to loosen his coat and after a bit of a struggle, manages to strip it off and shove it aside to the floor. “I’m a Mage after all. Bloody scourge upon mankind. get treated as guilty your whole life, you begin to feel it, whether it’s true or fair or not. Everyone sees you that way, and you get nowhere unless you’re contrite from the get-go, apologizing for the accident of your birth. Speak a lie often enough and it brands itself on you.” Anders rolls to his side, to give Fenris room, and the opportunity to spoon against his back.

Fenris only bothers to stand by the bed long enough to peel off his armor, setting it aside on the nearest table. The sword is unstrapped and loosened from his back and just tiredly falls, the tip threatening to chip the tile as the deep sound of it hitting the floor reverberates up the blade. He turns to grasp the handle, raising it to set it down along the table. With only his vest and leggings left the elf slinks onto the bed and predictably into place, his sigh content against Anders’ back. “Nobody sees you that way, much to my disappointment. You’d think they’d be more eager.”

Anders’s body shifts, snuggling back against Fenris. He echoes that contented sigh, letting his eyes shut. The room feels too cold, but Fenris is deliciously warm. “Then you should feel vindicated that I only argued so hard against you all this time because in my heart I felt you were right.” Grim fact, but Anders voices it almost playfully. “No wonder Justice can’t make sense of anyone in this world. But if you really think the others don’t just see me as, what was it, a nigh bottomless wellspring of mad bullshit? Then I can feel blessed beyond deserving.”

Fenris waits for Anders to get comfortable before doing the same, finding any remaining contours between them and making any small changes to make them seamless, and drops his forehead to Anders’ back. He loosely draws his arm up to drape over the mage. “I’ve tried to tell them at length, I assure you.” It rumbles so easily off his tongue, and he smiles, even as his eyes are drifting shut. “I can’t believe we’re fighting in bed.” The laziest fight ever.

“We’re not fighting, I’m agreeing with you.” Anders can’t help but grin at the irony of that statement. “Alright, that was fighting then, that last part. What I can’t believe is how -happy- it makes me.”


	18. Chapter 18

There is a cat.

 

Anders has been setting out milk and sometimes tablescraps in hopes of attracting a cat. One elusive juvenile tabby in particular he’s been courting, the stray having grown brave enough to sniff at Anders’s fingertips. After a few days, the cat had begun to hang around the manor doors persistently. And now, the cat has chosen to come inside. The crumbling roof lets a fair number of sunbeams into the place during the day, and the cat is curled up in one of them. Anders is lying on his belly on the threadbare carpet, gently stroking the napping cat’s head and ears. The tiny tabby purrs louder than a rumbling mill-wheel.

The door to the mansion opens a couple rooms away as Fenris returns from a quick stop at the Hanged Man to see Varric. There was something comical about simply getting your gambling winnings in the form of bottles, but when the dwarf mentioned that the tavern was getting an uncommon stock in that happened to coincide with the fact that the agreggio pavali had just run out, he couldn’t turn the offer down. How he manages to last a single day without alcohol much less two, he’ll never know.  
He heads along the side rooms to beeline for the kitchen, and sets the bottles down on the counter before his memory makes him backtrack a few steps to see Anders and a cat through the open door he just passed. “Well… it’s certainly small.”

The cat picks up his head to look at Fenris through eyes narrowed by a massive yawn. He stretches, shows his pale, fluffy tummy, and resettles on his side. "I hate to dash your hopes but he’ll grow. He looks to be only a few months old. Yes, you’re a -wittle- kitty.“ Anders scratches the cat under his chin, the cat stretching his neck and tilting his head back in enjoyment. "Just a wittle kitty who wants scritchies on his wittle chin…”

Fenris reaches out to pick up on of the bottles before he approaches, uncorking it and taking a swig as he crouches to figure out what he makes of this tiny beast. Of course he said Anders could have one, but that didn’t mean he’d decided on liking it or not. And really he only has one other reference point. “There were cats in Tevinter. One of the only things the magisters allowed to roam freely between them.”

“There were cats in Ferelden too, obviously. Cats, in Dogland. A rough life for a kitty. Probably part of why I get along with them so well.” Anders smiles up at Fenris, and there’s very little wryness in his face. The mage seems uncomplicatedly happy, for once. As for the cat, he immediately becomes more alert as Fenris approaches, rolling upright to get his paws under him but keeping low to the floor, large yellow-green eyes watching Fenris’s every move. The small cat’s ears appear to be naturally floppy and fold over in the middle, making the tiny creature seem even more cowed. "I’m thinking of naming this one Knight Captain Mewins. He reminds me of that sad-eyed Templar.“

"I thought you hated templars.” Fenris glances up to study Anders’ expression, before looking back down at the cat. He doesn’t make any attempts to offer a hand, but tilts his head to one side as he presses his lips back to the wine bottle thoughtfully. “Of all the cats in Kirkwall, you chose the defective one.”

“I hate the order. Some of the individuals manage, from time to time, not to be horrid. And Ser Mewins isn’t defective, he’s endearing.” Anders pouts emphatically and strokes the cat from head to tail. When Fenris makes to further moves, the cat relaxes again, tucking his paws underneath himself and purring again, blinking slowly up at Fenris as if smugly content over having stolen his boyfriend.

“It’s a runt, the wrong color and it likely can’t hear. The magisters would have had me kill it like the others like it.” Not that he actually means ill will toward this one, per se, but there’s just no way you can’t call this thing defective. In his best attempt to make peace with the animal he reaches forward with a single finger, tipping up one of the ears into it’s rightful position before lifting away and letting it fold back into place. Strange.

The cat turns his head, not objecting too strongly to Fenris’s approach, but clearly trying to sniff that outstretched finger. "I told you, he’s not full grown yet, and what do you mean ‘the wrong color’? He’s a tabby. I love tabby cats. Dat’s right Mewins, I wuv wittle tabbies.“ Mewins lowers his head and shuts his eyes as Anders scratches behind his flopped-over ears. "Just because his ears are floppy doesn’t mean he can’t hear.”  
Something sinks in and Anders looks up at Fenris with wide, sad eyes. "They… did they really /make you kill kittens?!/“

"They let cats roam, not strays. The cats looked the same, the rest were pests the cooks would kill with whiskey.” How typical that an elvhen born spirit would be recycled as undrinkable poison in Tevinter. “If I had known I would be bedding a mage, I would have brought you one.”

Anders looks… torn. With each passing day he spends with Fenris, Tevinter sounds more and more abominable, and now he learns that his 'making the world unsafe for kittens and virgins’ quip hadn’t been at all off the mark. Fenris saying he would have wanted to give him a proper Tevinter cat anyhow, though, is astoundingly sweet, and he blushes faintly at that. "Thank you,“ he says bashfully. "I think I love this defective runt all the same. What did 'proper’ cats in Tevinter look like?”

Fenris drops his hand away from the kitten so he can prop his chin on his knuckles. “White. With blue eyes, though the archon kept several that had red.” He pauses a moment, watching Anders’ eyes neutrally. “Danarius kept one with one blue, one yellow. They prized them; anything less spread fast and was treated like a plague.”

Anders shrugs a bit. Ser Mewins rises and stretches, rear in the air and splayed paws reaching as far in front as they can. "It sounds like they don’t understand cats properly in Tevinter,“ Anders says. "Are they graceful? Certainly. But under that veneer of predatory grace they’re cuddly, desperate for attention, and willing to make complete fools of themselves for the sake of catching a piece of string. Cats are wasted on people with no sense of humor.”

“If you think so. I think they’re all useless, regardless.” Because really. Even if this one isn’t deaf it must be hard of hearing. Humans are bad enough about that, without their ears folded over. “They aren’t exactly useful if there aren’t rats.” Though honestly that might change, now that Anders has stocked the pantry.

“Utility is really beside the point,” Anders says. He scoots over on the floor until he’s hip to hip with Fenris. Mewins goes off in chase of a small spider, stumbling excitedly and getting a giggle from Anders. "Thank you for letting me keep him.“

(oh god another porn alert. Huge, huge alert. Ten pages of alert. -broody)

Fenris takes another swig of the bottle before setting the glass down at his side, the kitten far enough away to be a danger of knocking into it. He regards it as if the cat will magically make sense to him, but the only thing that whispers in his mind is the fact that the alcohol burn of the wine that he’s letting idle in his mouth is slowly constricting the veins under his tongue. With a small sigh through his nose that he’ll never ‘get’ cats, he reaches for Anders’ chin as he leans down to kiss him with the mouthful.

 

Anders lifts his chin. His lips yield and part for Fenris, and there’s a surprised murmur as warm red wine flows into his mouth. He laps it from Fenris’s tongue, lets it linger between them before he swallows some of it down. When he opens his eyes again, he gives Fenris a smoldering look. He pushes himself up onto his knees.

Despite the fact that he started it, Fenris looks a little surprised at how good of a reaction this gets for what began as a boredly creative thing to do with the wine. He pulls away before it spills between them and swallows, the armor-bare underside of his thumb absently passing over his lips to brush the drop of red from one corner.

Anders licks his lips and ducks down to catch that thumb in his mouth. His teeth scrape against the metal, but his tongue caresses skin as he sucks for that tiny trace of wine. There are sweet hints of Lyrium in the taste of Fenris’s skin, as well, and his eyes roll back with indulgent pleasure as he lets them flutter shut.

Fenris stops, the curve of lyrium along this throat rippling once as he silently gulps. Very carefully he turns his hand, and his fingers curve up along Anders’ jawline as his thumb presses down to slowly rub across the hot, soaking tongue. It’s enough to make his dick stir. “I should starve you of wine more often.”

Anders is breathing hard. He opens his eyes again, dilated pupils making his honey eyes look dark. He would tell Fenris that it isn’t the wine he’s starved for, but it would involve his mouth being empty, and just now that would be intolerable. So instead he moans around Fenris’s thumb and sucks it deeper.

Fenris raises his free arm to his mouth, and as he reluctantly takes his eyes off of Anders he unsnaps the clasps with his teeth, and lets the armor fall loudly enough that the cat startles. He reaches forward to work Anders’ belt looser, sudden and quite determined to get the man’s pants down as fast as possible.

Anders lets Fenris’s thumb go with a gasp. He leans back, cheeks flushing as he sees the straining bulge in his trousers and does what he can to help Fenris push them down and let his cock spring free. He reaches down, wrapping a first around his shaft and pumping upwards, coaxing himself completely hard with his eyes fixed on Fenris.

 

Fenris reluctantly retreats long enough to unsnap and peel off the remaining gauntlet. He sits up for a second to do so, lingers as he corks the wine in an afterthought, and while the edges of his vest obscure it in shadow his erection is obvious and pressing. But the view is shortlived as he leans forward again, a hand on Anders’ chest to push him a bit farther back without toppling him, and kisses the mage’s lips with an oddly distracted sort of fever.

Anders leans, then settles back, arm braced against the floor, still sharing warm, wet kisses with Fenris. He raises a knee to let Fenris’s trapped hard-on brush his thigh. In the background, unnoticed, Ser Mewins is going spelunking in the bracer portion of one of Fenris’s gauntlets.

Once Anders is in a better position Fenris’ hand drops to swat away the man’s grasp. His fingers spread as his palm slowly drags down the shaft, thumb and forefinger collaring the base as the rest of his palm cups and gently squeezes Anders’ balls. He makes a soft, low moan at his own movements, and his hips unconsciously roll a slow thrust along the offered pressure.

“Mmmm…!” Anders’s head drops back and his cock flexes against the circle of Fenris’s forefinger and thumb. The gentle pressure on his balls makes him moan again, makes them feel full. It’s clear that Fenris has a plan, and Anders grows more curious by the moment what it might be.

Fenris’ grip loosens and circles out of the way as he shifts onto his stomach, and his lips easily land on the base of Anders’ erection in the freshly bare spot between his fingers. The bridge of his nose softly nuzzles at the shaft as he plants a few more deliberate kisses along lower, hair teasing at the head with the lightest brushstrokes as he draws his tongue along the soft skin.

It takes effort for Anders to lift his head again. A languid and relaxed sort of pleasure spreads through him in waves from where Fenris kisses and licks him, making him want to do nothing but let his joints go loose and his body just indulge. But he needs to see, given how often he’s conjured the thought of Fenris’s lips on his cock to help him through a lonely night. Feeling like the back of his hair might as well be strung with lead weights, he lifts his head to look, and moans out loud at what he sees. Fenris’s face, almost rapturous as his tongue glides along his shaft. "Fuck…“ he murmurs. He realizes he can’t remember the last time someone did this for him. Precum wells in the indentation at his tip like a clear gem. If he wasn’t riveted to the spot with pleasure and need he thinks he would be screaming from the rooftops some manner of ode to Fenris’s perfect mouth, his smoldering dark eyes and agile tongue. His empty mouth craves to fill itself, and with the absence of anything to kiss his mind reaches desperately for words.

Fenris pushes his elbows under himself to comfortably prop his front, the metal along his chest uncomfortable in several places if he bothered to notice. His hand spreads out over the back of the shaft, pressing upward with his kisses as his lips begin to part across and lightly suck at the softly defined throat. The free hand settles flat against the base his mouth has trailed away from, palm cupping down with a pressure just firm enough to be noticed. The small exclamation comes as an honest surprise enough that the elf looks up, half expecting that he’s done something wrong, his bottom lip still draped over Anders’ cock.

Anders is watching with astonished eyes, panting through his open mouth. "Don’t stop,” he moans. "…Maker be praised, that mouth…. “ His brows knit together, lift up, astonishment turning to a plea. The way Fenris’s bottom lip pulls away from his teeth… the intensity of his green eyes glimmering from below his black brows…”..I could come just from -watching- you do this, Fenris.“ The flush in Anders’s face deepens with that confession.

 

Fenris does his best to not give a small eyeroll at that confirmation and turns his attention back down. His paused lips curve into a soft pucker and he tips his chin down to meet the velvety skin under him. The kisses continue with an almost teasing but carefully passionate trail upward, his lips pouting and loose as they plant along the shaft, tongue dipping into the suction created to add warmth and emphasize even the softest smacks of air. Finally his palm lifts Anders’ erection to a better angle and his kiss almost delicately lands on the head, the curve of his lips resting flush along the ridge as his tongue probes the slit and he sucks at the plump tip in earnest.

More warm precum wells up against the tip of Fenris’s tongue, even the edges of Anders’s slit turning flushed and full. His toes curl in his boots and his hands clench into fists, Anders having to set aside the urge to cup the back of Fenris’s head and urge him down. He lifts his hips just slightly, wanting more of Fenris’s warm mouth, but every tease he gives is so perfect that it tempts him towards passivity. In the back of his mind, he begins to realize, Fenris has had a lot of practice.

Fenris presses his tongue flatter over the head, firmly and slowly swirling and spreading the saltier taste over the tip before licking it up in similar deliberate motions. With a slow rolling of his lower palm the higher one along the shaft moves, curling around the fat cock to draw steady strokes up towards his mouth. He lifts his head away, barely long enough to dart his tongue over his lips, before he presses back down with a tight kiss, forcing the tip to press against him before giving way. The erection sinks into him, his tongue pressed up against the underside, and he lets his lips pop over the pronounced ridge before he lifts back up to start again.

Anders clenches his teeth as his eyes begin to lose focus. His thighs on either side of Fenris are beginning to tremble, the rounded muscles of his belly standing out as they tighten. He gives a few mild, rolling thrusts against Fenris’s mouth, staring as a few threads of precum link his tip to Fenris’s mouth and snap. His breath comes out in a hiss as Fenris’s lips push down to suck his tip, and he can feel himself responding even more to the urgings of Fenris hands. "I’m close,” he warns breathlessly as his balls begin to tighten in Fenris’s cupped palm.

Fenris gives a short, half-moaned sound in response. He leans his attentions back a little, giving Anders the best view, and on the next time he lets Anders’ cock penetrate his mouth he lets it past the head by a couple inches and holds steady, his tongue dragging under the tip and arching forward, the wet pad pillowed against the slit. His hand rocks up, fingers splaying into the open air a moment as the heel of his palm grinds into the shaft, then wraps again tighter than before. The movement changes, short and more pleading, but the strokes themselves still rolling in the motions enough that they never distinctly jerk against the mage’s shaft.

“..too /good/…!” Anders watches for just a heartbeat before his head drops back, a slowly rising groan filling the air. He fights to keep his hips still as his cock swells drum tight and then jumps in Fenris’s mouth, the first warm flood of his come bathing Fenris’s working tongue. The supple channel in his cock is thick with each surge of Anders’ climax, swollen until it stands out against the underbelly, making it so receptive to Fenris’s hand massaging it and milking him for more.

Fenris’ hand slows, thumb pressing down against the throbbing shaft and pushing upward as he milks the orgasm for all it’s worth. His tongue sweeps over the tip as he swallows the initial load, lips backing from the shaft and using the defined edges of the slick head to form a good seal. He keeps dutifully suckling at the tip, eyes closed in blissful focus to his other senses, and now able to let the cream spread over his tongue before he swallows.

Even through the blazing intensity of climax Anders can feel the slightly heavier, thicker wetness of his cream pooling in Fenris’s mouth. The thought of it, the sense of it, has his balls draw achingly tight, the spasms in his core wracking him more persistently than he’s used to as if trying to flood that perfect mouth. Propped up on one trembling arm Anders does his best to watch, looking to see if a few drops of his climax seep from the corners of Fenris’s lips.

Nothing does. Fenris is efficient and clean, not a single drop of a mess in his wake. As Anders’ orgasm draws out in thick, slower bursts he swallows most of the load. With a press forward of his tongue he draws away, the head of the twitching cock freshly covered in it’s own gloss as it meets the open air mixed with his hot breath. He leaves his mouth open, the tip cradled carefully on his tongue as more cum pools there, and he holds still for a few long moments before his lips close again to swallow and lick his display clean. Eventually he can taste the last drops being dragged out, and with a final deep kiss he pulls away, pushing himself up to sit upright and suddenly feeling rather self conscious.

When Fenris opens his mouth to show Anders the come glistening on his tongue, Anders whimpers. He does his best to imprint that sight on his memory, overriding a fleeting concern that if it’s possible to come onesself to death, Fenris runs the risk of getting him there. Anders falls back, braced on his bent elbows while he gasps for breath, his chest and belly rising and falling. "Why… are you… so far away…?“ He pants the words when Fenris sits upright, craving the ability to grab onto him and haul him close.

Fenris’ eyes spare a quick glance in Anders’ direction, and takes that as the only cue he needs to shift his weight back forward, planting his hands to either side as he drops his head and kisses at the mage’s neck, much in the same way he’d been kissing cock earlier.

Anders puts an arm around Fenris, hauling him down to the floor with him and doing his best to return each kiss. His warm breath stirs Fenris’s hair, his lips drag along the rim of his ear. He presses his thigh in between Fenris’s legs, not about to forget that his lover still needs satisfaction.

Despite the kisses Fenris seems a faint standoffish after he’s pulled back down, not entirely cold but quieter than his usually explosive rush this had all started out with. All the same he seems to be in no immediate rush to stop. His kisses falter to lean against the crook of Anders’ neck, shuddering a small, if surprised gasp as he appreciatively grinds his none too subtle bulge against the touch. He’s never gotten attention back after that. Well, nothing that meant anything beyond cruel teasing.

Anders does take notice, even through the warm golden fog of the afterglow. Every time he’s been with Fenris, minutes and hours were consumed in passion, kindling thrown on a bonfire. He made love as if the fire in him would sear him to ash for anything less. But Fenris seems meek, now, and that standoffishness is something Anders has begun to learn comes hand in hand with Fenris feeling more vulnerable than he wants to. "Let me finish you, love.” Anders whispers in Fenris’s ear between kisses, a gentle shift of his body urging Fenris to lie back.

Fenris reluctantly pulls away to sit back, moving his hands to prop under his shoulderblades, and turns his head to one side to hide whatever the hell it is hes feeling. He’s not even sure what it is, but some part of him was thrown back to Tevinter habits more intensely than he expected a damn blowjob would do. At this point he really wants nothing more than to run away from this, but that’s the problem. There’s nowhere to go, and that feels too familiar even if it’s for entirely different reasons.

Anders moves along with Fenris. As the elf leans back, he rolls onto his knees, hands braced on the floor on either side of Fenris to hold his body over him. He lets his chest rest against Fenris’s while he kisses the bottom of his ear, the corner of his jaw, and opens his eyes to see Fenris turned away. "Fenris,“ he murmurs. "Come back. I’m here.” Anders pushes his forehead into the curve of Fenris’s neck where it meets his shoulder.

Fenris snaps out of it enough to lean the weight of his head forward against Anders’, easier when he doesn’t have to directly face the man while still close enough to bury his nose against the blonde hair and his softly musky scent that’s all so iconically Anders in his mind. “I’m sorry, it’s not…” The words trail off as he’s unsure how to even finish that sentence.

“It’s alright,” Anders whispers. His voice is laden with tenderness, as warm as that smell in his hair. "Just be with me. It’s alright…“ Soothing words, soothing contact, another nuzzle from those soft lips and scratchy chin. Everything meant to remind Fenris that he doesn’t need to suffer alone. 

Fenris deliberately takes a deep breath and sighs, and presses forward against the faint prickling from Anders’ face. It’s something unique to the moment he can focus on. A hand raises from the carpet, the tiny wellworn bristles leaving small imprints on his palm, and wraps it around the small of Anders’ back in a loose hug, the only pressure from his weight as it shifts.

Anders goes on nuzzling and kissing, pressing his body close, trying to give comfort with contact. "That’s it, breathe… stay with me, love. You’re not alone…” He lets the crest of his hip rest against Fenris’s groin, just a tacit offer if Fenris wants to resume. Even the metal of Fenris’s breastplate is beginning to warm from contact with Anders’s skin.

Fenris grinds his hips upwards to the touch, erection still pressing up against his clothes despite the moments of insecurity, warm and thick against the bone. “Don’t stop, I need.. this.” This touch, the distraction, anything Anders can throw out so he can drag himself out of this quicksand he’s fallen into.

“Then you had best be taking off your clothes.” Anders nips at Fenris’s ear after that husky whisper, drawing back enough to give Fenris some room to move. He kneels up and pulls the tie out of his hair, combing his fingers through it, casting a shy glance in Fenris’s direction as he stretches in a deliberate display. It still seems strange and almost unbelievable to him that Fenris enjoys looking at him, but there’s far too much evidence that he does.

Fenris reaches his hand over to undo the belts securing his chest plate at the command, more instinctive than anything else, and stops as he drags it away from his lean chest and looks up. Anders is, as much as he hates to admit it even silently to himself, somewhat naturally intimidating by the simple fact that humans are all around a bit larger beings. The amount of tenderness shown goes all the farther for it, and after watching the staged look and hair fall the elf sits up straighter after the mage, lips finding his neck with more hunger as he works his leggings down with a thumb.

Anders tips his head back, his breath an pulse a flicker in the hollow of his throat as Fenris kisses him. He’s sure the small moan he stifles can be felt there more than heard. His arms wrap around Fenris’s back and hold him in the way he’s growing accostumed to, wrists crossed and hands flexed back and away.  
“I love the way you kiss me,” Anders whispers, lowering his chin again in a gentle brush against the side of Fenris’s face. It’s true. He can’t remember ever being kissed the way Fenris does. Not so much the feel of his warm breath or his smooth lips, but the passion and the craving and the tenderness behind it.  
He can remember kissing that way, but even with Karl it was rare for him to be given so much affection, so generously. There was never the sense that it was payment for something he’d done or something he wanted done. It was simply for him, because those were the feelings between them. Is that how it had been with Karl, and since? Love had been a game, a trade… giving a certain hilarious new meaning to 'tit for tat.’

Fenris parts open the kisses, the pecks growing a little more passionate as he comes back to life, sucking at the tender but stubbled skin, brushing his tongue out across the small swell of an adams apple. His cock hardens to the sudden open air, his vest splitting just above it. The belt still around his waist bothers him enough that he reaches for it instead of his shaft, unbuckling the wide leather and letting it drop away like heavy arms from his slim hips, their profile of subtle curves all the more visible with only the less defensive clothes remaining.

Anders opens his eyes as Fenris’s belt hits the floor. He looks down over the elf’s shoulder, along the sleek and soft contours of his body, enjoying even the slightly obscured view of Fenris’s rear. He brings his forehead to Fenris’s forehead, looks Fenris in the eyes as he murmurs, “Much better.” He wets his lips with the tip of his tongue as he thinks of what he’d like to do. Something he’s never done exactly deliberately… and his slowly spreading smile seems to cup a lascivious mystery in its curve. "I need you to stand. Stand and lean back against something solid.“

Fenris tucks his feet under himself and rolls his heels into a stand, and reaches behind him as he backs up the couple feet it takes to press back against the wall. His body is hot from the pent up lust it’s been feeling this entire time, pores open and mouth parted as he unconsciously diffuses the warmth into the air, and it makes the marble wall feel all the colder as his palm presses to it, the chill momentarily like a strip of ice against the bare skin along his spine. It nearly makes him jump, but he doesn’t so much as glance away from Anders, less trying to escape into the moment and now reveling in it again.

Anders shifts forward on his knees, looking up into Fenris’s eyes and savoring the lust he sees in them. A subdued twist of a smile at his lips and he bows his head, lowers himself on hands and knees to tease kisses across Fenris’s bare feet, the very tip of tongue lapping at the gaps between his toes. He lets his loose hair drag across the tops of Fenris’s feet and then begins to kiss his way up his legs, tracing the inner edge of one of the curving marks that sweeps up and around from calf to inner thigh. He braces his hands against the wall for balance as he kneels up again. Fenris’s legs are long and lithe, and licking their entire length gives Anders an even greater appreciation of just how gorgeously long.

Fenris shivers, the cold and the creeping touch along his skin mixing in his nerves and making it all so delicious, and leaving him all the more sensitive for it. His cock hardens, each detail of Anders’ lips growing clearer with each kiss and lap of his tongue, and with a heavy pant his eyes flutter and threaten to close to completely focus all of his consciousness on the mage’s affections. "Get on with it.” The words themselves might be rough but his tone is tempered, hiding an edge of pleading.

Anders raises his lips, looking Fenris in the eye as, with a quick motion, he seizes the loose skin along the underside of his erection between his teeth and gives a sharp, almost threatening tug. Then his lips and tongue sooth the hurt away, Anders letting his tongue glide along the tender underbelly until he reaches the tip. He asks for help with a silent glance upward, his lips full and slack against the spot just below the tip of Fenris’s cock, where the looser skin is gathered. The curve of that thick hardon makes it awkward to get into his mouth without a hand to guide it down.

Fenris sucks in a just as sharp breath of air through his teeth, and his lips remain parted as his breath becomes heavier, the exhales curving his stomach in slow waves away from his erection. With a small, shaky nod of silent understanding he reaches for his shaft, placing a loose ring of fingers over the hilt and using his thumb to press down, giving a better angle to the desperate cock.

 

Anders rises up on his knees to let Fenris’s velvet shaft brush along his face. He looks up at Fenris with a steady, shameless gaze. With Fenris’s thick shaft eclipsing his face, the submission of the act is in implicit, and the willingness is plain as day as Anders takes Fenris’s tip into his mouth. He does his best to mimic one of the techniques Fenris used on him, sealing his lips at the ridge of the tip and sucking delicately, flexing the tip of his tongue to worry at the slit.

Fenris catches the very edge of his lip under one canine, his erection straining to go deeper. This feels a lot more torturous when turned around on him, and despite his best efforts to leave it his hand closes around his shaft, squeezing firmly to at least add a comforting pressure that cools the faint anxiety distracting him from fully appreciating Anders’ tongue. Which, given the option, he wants to remember every last inch of it. Precum, already waiting since he was sucking on Anders’ cock in the first place, wells up readily and drips from the capped erection, and he moans as it’s padded off of the plump head.

The tip of Anders’s tongue paints Fenris’s cockhead in a cool mix of saliva and precum. A few slow, teasing circles around that smooth, plump tip, and Anders takes in more of Fenris’s length. He sucks hard enough to hollow his cheeks, his lips tight around Fenris’s shaft and pumping it slowly, a little more length taken in on each stroke until Fenris can feel his tip at the entrance to Anders’s throat. Anders shuts his eyes now. It takes obvious concentration for him to deny his reflexes as he swallows Fenris into his smooth, tight throat.

Fenris’ hand loosens from his shaft to fall away as Anders sinks farther onto him, his lip falling from his small bite as his jaw drops. His eyes flutter shut for a moment, mind blanking save the firey heat of Anders’ mouth, the lips smoothing over the shaft and carefully gentle brush of teeth, and the tip, filled tight, dripping with slick precum as it drags along the back of Anders’ throat for a moment before pressing deeper. He mutters something lowly in the back of his throat, the accent sounding vaguely from Tevinter but too jumbled to be understandable.

Anders holds Fenris’s cock in his throat, his lips meeting the skin low on Fenris’s pubis, the very hilt of his shaft. He swallows around Fenris’s tip, the motion like tightening, rolling squeeze. Another swallow, and Anders pulls his head back quickly, sucking in a breath of air when he’s free to. Then he begins again, lips and tongue teasing Fenris’s tip before he works his way down the shaft again, taking more and more, steeling himself, swallowing again.

A small shudder racks Fenris’ body, trailing down from his shoulders as Anders swallows, the muscles forcing a downward stroke over the tip that drags on the ridge and hugs at the moist head. The loose skin at Fenris’ balls pull and tightens as he’s teased and brought farther down again, his hips slowly leaning forward as Anders swallows again, cock dripping with precum as if the shaft needed further coaxing to slide along the soft tongue.

Anders holds onto Fenris’s cock for a longer moment, his throat swallowing around the thick tip again and again while his tongue writhes against the underside of the slick shaft. He hides involuntary tears behind closed eyelids as he pulls back, this time dragging lips and teeth along the shaft before he opens his jaws and sucks in a breath of air. He wraps a hand around the base of Fenris’s shaft, hoping that need will let him keep it there as he gives it a flurry of quick tugs. He brings his mouth to the head again, his lips just past the ridge, his tongue pressing in against the slit and writhing there.

Fenris drops his head back against the wall, eyes winced shut, his jaw torn between clenching his teeth together or dropping as his lungs start to complain for air in their heady, hard panting. He gulps as his throat dries from the gasping, and raises his hand to draw over and knit among the strands of Anders’ hair. The low moan that escapes his throat chokes as the touch wraps around his cock and his eyes snap open to look down, but he drops his head back again to just watch, too caught up in his approaching orgasm to push the mage’s hand away.

Anders gives a muffled moan at the feeling of Fenris’s fingers threading through his hair. He forces his head down for one last, rough swallow, then drags back slowly, the tip of Fenris’s cock popping free of his throat after a long, constricting tug. His fingers massage against the tender channel in Fenris’s shaft, Anders lavishing wet kisses on his tip until he tastes the first bitter surge of seed. And then, panting, eyes open, he leans back, tilts his head up, and milks Fenris’s cock onto his face and into his open mouth.

Fenris’ cock throbs violently in Anders’ hand as it’s finally given release, stomach tightening and orgasm injecting his muscles with heavy jolts before he even has a chance to give warning. Not that the mage seems unready, and he watches in small shock as his thick erection spills across the man’s paler skin in heavy spasms, the sight alone making him feel a bit weak at the knees. The man’s chin barely scratches at the underside of his shaft, underlines what his eyes are telling him, the slight hints of degredation tugging at the edge of his mind in a terrible way that just prolongs his climax. Despite the earlier moaning he seems to forget them now, silent and shuddering.

Anders milks Fenris’s pulsing dick with long, slow tugs. Only when his cream starts to come in fat, heavy drips instead of forceful spurts does Anders lean in to start licking him clean. His hand drops away to wrap idly around his renewed erection, and he goes to work with only his mouth and tongue, letting the last spasms of climax nuzzle Fenris’s seeping tip against his face. Sticky ropes of come stretch from Anders’s cheek to Fenris’s cock, then sag and break. The cream on Anders’s face drips onto his chest as he settles on his knees, making no move to clean himself beyond a slow lick across open, come-splattered lips.

As his orgasm finally subsides Fenris crumples to his knees, breathless as a hand latches onto Anders’ shoulder for support and he leans forward into a kiss, his cum smearing between them. It’s short, as he’s quick to break them for air, and he finally gets a dedicated, undistracted view of Anders’ face. With an exhausted smile he chuckles. “You look ridiculous.”

Anders seems profoundly satisfied with that. "I hope you enjoyed making a mess of me,“ he answers, his voice almost a purr. He begins to suck what’s left of Fenris’s jism from his fingers. "Nothing really says 'I’m your bitch forever’ like taking a shot in the face.” The mischief in his eyes gives way to tenderness. "Maker, it’s good to see you smile that way,“ he murmurs.

Fenris’ chuckle fades, his smile losing enthusiasm but still lingering with a small crook to one edge of his lips as he glances down. "I don’t think I’ve been this happy in a long time.” His eyes trail back up well after the sentence is over, and he vainly tries to wipe a thumb over a streak of cum but only manages to spread it like a glaze, which just makes him smirk a little more.

Anders bows his head, beginning to grin with pent-up laughter. "Love, I believe your dirty mage needs a bath. Join me if you like.“ He does lean in to quickly lick the thumb Fenris attempts to clean him with, though. Anders gets to his feet, a bit dizzy still with pleasure, picks his pants up off the floor, and heads for the stairs with a deliberately absurd sashay to his hips.


	19. Chapter 19

Fenris finds himself alone and opening the door to the Hanged Man,the prospect of this notably easier when a kitten is involved. Their earlier argument had gotten to him, a seed of it rooting down and itching at his mind ever since it sprouted. The pub is loud, packed with people and several raucous parties tonight, and he heads for the bar in hopes that Isabela will be perched on one of the stools, because he doubts he’ll find her otherwise in this chaos unless she starts a fight.

Isabela’s in her usual spot. The last person who took Isabela’s barstool ended up getting nudged awake by the city guard, in an alley, without his pants. In order to discourage further incidents, she has actually carved her name on the seat. She spots Fenris on his way over and her lips tighten in a flat line for a moment. Looking past him she notices an absence of blonde hair and feathers, and she shakes her head. "Here without your beau? I hope you didn’t leave him tied to the bed-board.“

Fenris reaches for one of the few other nearby stools that’s empty, flicks it over so he can perch at her side and wave in front of them to order ‘the usual’. It’s not hard for them to remember who he is, with the scars. Well someone looks like he intends to stay for bit. "Some things I need to do without him. What did he tell you?”

Isabela smiles a familiar smile, filled with innuendo. "Once I could get him to stop going on and on about how he’d never felt this way and he would do anything for you, he told me this -lovely- anecdote about you letting him be on top. So.“ Isabela props a chin on her hand, elbow braced against the bar. She looks at Fenris with bright, narrow eyes, like a contented cat. "Have you got something to tell me then? Was he any good or should I give him some instruction?”

“He was /fine/.” Fenris sighs pointedly that he said even that much, and as a mug is shoved his way he picks it up to take a heavy swig and try to forget about how many details she knows. He can only hope she keeps them to herself, but doubtless it’ll all be published, with fabrications to make him into a templar. “I didn’t come here to talk about him. He told me.. how you felt.”

Isabela pauses in mid-gulp, her mug to her lips. She pointedly looks at anything but Fenris, but by now, she already knows how he looks when he gets that note in his voice. She swallows, sighs, and sets down her ale. "I’m alright. I’m fine, that’s all there is to it, and your lover is such a worry-wart.“

"And he’s not the one that brought me here.” Fenris sets his drink down, watches her try to throw it off like it was nothing in a way that is just so unlike her. He realizes that it’ll take too much time, if he just waits for her to look him in the eye. “I wanted to apologize.”

Isabela turns slowly and looks Fenris in the eyes. Those /pretty/ eyes. "I’m not really sure what for. You always let me come first, it was downright gallant.“

Fenris’ eyes that she’s focused on just grow more pained, the longer she acts out of character. So Anders wasn’t exaggerating, and it really did hurt her without his notice. He continues; even if she ignores him now she’ll at least hear that he said it. "I didn’t realize what it was you wanted. It wasn’t my intention to hurt you.”

Isabela lowers her face for a moment. She lets the mask slip. She’s known Fenris long enough, well enough, to give him that. When she looks back up her eyes are wistful. Not entirely sad, but somewhat. "I’m not sure I realized what I wanted either, until I found out it wouldn’t happen. It isn’t your fault, Fenris. It’s… mine, really.“ She shakes her head. "You needed more than what I gave you.” At this point, she can’t resist the urge to smirk and add, “Like a great, big dick, for example.”

Fenris tsks with a small shake of his head, and finally unpins her from his gaze as he takes another drink. “I should have paid more attention, I’m sorry. In a way, it would have been easier, with you. You ..” He pauses, thinking carefully over his words. “don’t remind me of anything.”

Isabela nods, watching Fenris quietly. "I’m here if you want to talk about it. And I’m also here to put a shiv in that mage if he ever hurts you. I’ve …thought about the two of you.“ And from her tone, not just about the two of them in bed together. Or against the wall together. Or in the bath together. "And it makes me wonder if that’s what makes him so right for you. That he makes you face the hard things… and overcome them. Hopefully.”

Fenris smirks humorlessly, staring down at the fine fizz coating the inner edges of his mug, barely cold. The glaze on the rim of the ceramic is chipped, with a tiny hairline crack forming that’ll eventually wind it’s way downward until it has to be thrown out. It’s stupid, how he wonders if these things reflect on how he and Anders still have arguments despite their relationship. He feels that he knows the underlying issue, though. “Only if you could use it to separate him from that demon.”

Isabela hmmphs, her expression turning serious. "Threesomes. So much fun in bed, so much drama out of bed… I keep forgetting to think about his passenger. Did Justice… do something to you?“ Her eyes narrow.

"It’s nothing.” It’s a quick reaction that Fenris instantly knows insinuates otherwise. But he’s not about to mention the worst parts of what Justice did, throwing Anders to suffer in her name, and pull her into it with any hint of guilt. So he just mentions the decidedly lesser of the two evils. “He just touched me, when we had an agreement.”

Isabela frowns faintly. "Do you think it will get worse?“ She sighs heavily, lowering her head to her hand. "Oh, Fenris. I know you want this work and I want it to work for you, but… if he’s on his way down I don’t want him to take you with him. Is he losing this fight? Maker knows, it might not even be possible to win.”

“I don’t know. At times I think he’s better, then I question it.” It’s a sharp honesty, one that cuts into Fenris more than he expects when he says it aloud, and he takes a purposeful deep breath before taking a smaller quiet gulp of alcohol to loosen his mind around the idea. “I will stand by his side. If he looses, I will end it myself.”

And to think she’d kept her distance because she didn’t want to hurt Fenris. "You might want to talk to Varric about it. He’s a lot closer to Anders than I’m ever likely to be.“ Isabela tosses back the rest of her ale and then takes a deep breath. "He -looks- better. Like he’s eating and sleeping. Before, he was starting to get this look about him… if you’ve ever seen a man start to resemble his own ghost.”

“I hadn’t noticed.” It’s funny how true that is, but predictable when he thinks about it. On the rare occasion that Hawke took them somewhere together, Anders was more this presence he could uneasily feel at his back while engaged in the more direct issue of people trying to gut him. And that realization makes him turn his head back to Isabela, with sudden absent curiosity. “What was he like, before this?” Varric may know more, but he wants to hear her mind of it. He feels she would have a better idea if he’s done the mage some good, an idea which frankly hadn’t occurred to him.

Isabela picks up the fresh mug of ale that arrives, replaced almost the moment she sets down her empty mug. "He kept aloof a lot… either feeling awkward around the rest of us or simply lost in his own thoughts. And… he almost never smiled. Even when he did there was this sadness in his eyes that never went away and it was so… so strange. When I met him in Denerim he was all laughter and teasing and utter irreverence: in other words, fun. But since meeting him again in Kirkwall, I felt as if I hadn’t known him at all.“ She pauses, trying to think of anything further to say. "He has always been a healer through and through, though. I’ve even seen him heal street thugs and coterie that weren’t killed outright in fights with Hawke., just patching them up and leaving them for the guard. He… doesn’t like to fight. He has to work himself up to it and he’s a wreck by the time it’s done. The day we found Thrask’s daughter and killed her abomination, he cried for the girl. He tried to hide it but he was in tears. Merrill tried to console him but he told her she should learn a lesson from what they’d seen and he left. I would have been properly pissed at him if I didn’t think he’d meant well.”

Fenris seems in the middle of thought as she talks, and he is. Everything Anders has done until now is compared with the new information, things he hadn’t understood before clearing a bit. “Then the demon is more of a problem then I imagined.” Not that he knows of anything to do about it, other than be prepared to kill the mage if it comes to it, instead of just a distant and safe oath of loyalty. “…and he is naive.” That much he’d gathered but not from so much direct experience, and he sounds bothered by it.

“He is that,” Isabela answers with a slanted smile. "Now, let me ask you something that’s been on my mind. Why is it you want him? And has he treated you right?“

 

"He’s better than I could have imagined.” Fenris looks away at that, turning his head down towards his mug but not really looking at it, trusting his hair to fall and hide the soft heat on his cheeks while he struggles to answer the other question. “I think he’s the only person I can’t hurt. And he’s… familiar.” It hurts to admit, but there it is.

It’s not good enough to fool Isabela. After knowing Fenris this long she can almost smell it when he flusters. her serious expression gives way to one of her sly smiles, even though she shakes her head. “I thought that might be in there, somewhere. Familiar because he’s a mage? Or does he make your choices for you?”

 

Having it all so easily laid out in the open like that causes him to flinch, the muscles of his back going on edge, subtle under the stiffer paneling of his top unless you’d seen him moments before. “Does it matter?” Which of course means both, though from his reaction one likely wasn’t realized until now.

“It does. I’ve talked to him. He doesn’t want you to be a slave. Neither do I. I -will- steal you away from him if that’s what you’re trying to do. You can be my cabin-boy if you really want to be a slave again.” Isabela gives Fenris a catlike smile. "I’d keep you glistening, clad in nothing but jewels…“

Fenris balks at that, but more importantly looks back directly again as he snaps. "I’m not going to just /slink back to being a slave/ when Danarius isn’t around! You don’t understand, nothing in my life has been the same.”

“Then explain it to me.” Isabela uncrosses and recrosses her legs, looking at Fenris calmly. "You’re throwing yourself into this… thing… with a mage right after you ran away from one that abused you. You’re putting your all into a relationship with a man who may be losing his mind to a demon, and I want you to give me a good reason for putting your heart in harm’s way.“

Fenris stares a moment at her easy dissection of the relationship, then sinks his lips to his palm, fingers crossing over his eyes in a loose facepalm. "I wish I had a better answer than ‘I don’t know’. After living in Tevinter, the Seheron coast then here… nothing has been the same. He’s the only thing that doesn’t feel alien.”

“But does he make you happy?” Isabela asks with emphasis. "Do you -enjoy- him and I’m not just asking if he jollies your roger. Is he /fun/?“

"Does it have to be 'fun’?” Not counting the sex a lot of it has been arguments, and pain, and both of them hurt by things either now or in the past. And thoughts of the future just bring Danarius hunting him down, Justice causing something or the fact that Anders is a grey warden. “I’m happy. If only for a short time.”

“In your case at least some of it has got to be. Look, my opinion for all it’s worth, is this. If he makes you happy it’s worth fighting for. If not, you may as well sign on as my cabin boy.” Isabela smiles and then sighs, her shoulders rolling a shrug that makes her bosom strain and resettle in her bodice. "He’s mad about you. And even if I don’t know him well I can tell he’s trying.“

"I know.” Fenris’ gaze drifts from hers, though for once from simple thought instead of trying to hide. “It’s different, that someone thinks I matter so much.” Isabela included, honestly, and everyone else Hawke has connected him to. Having people give him the time of day is disorienting, but borders on intoxicating with Anders.

Isabela’s smile is wry as ever, but warm. "He’s not the only one,“ she says, though she gets the feeling Fenris has been realizing that. "You’re the absolute center of that apostate’s whole world. I’d say you should hear him gush but I get the feeling you have.” She pauses, her smile widening. "Now one of these days, maybe it will be enough for you to realize it’s not just some delusion on our part and you -do- matter so much.“

"Doubtful.” Fenris smirks the tiniest bit at that though, and lets his hand slip from his face. “But that doesn’t mean I’m not grateful.” After a few seconds, he sighs. “I’d wanted to talk about you, not this.” It’s magic, how she can turn the conversation like that without him realizing. Maybe he’s just blinded by the mage more than he knows. “I don’t want you to go, but that seems unfair of me.”

Isabela tilts her head, tapping her lower lip with one finger. "You don’t want me to go? I must admit I was a bit under the impression you had left me.“ She’s arch, of course, but that’s just her way. there’s nothing truly scathing or accusatory in her tone.

"Here I thought you were under the impression that I needed a man.” Which is really to say, a good dicking. “But I know you’re going to leave. You don’t dream of ships to leave them tied to a dock.”

“Aaaaaah that.” Isabela leans back on her stool. There’s a certain light in her eyes whenever she thinks of ships and the open sea, and she makes no effort to hide it now. "I will, someday. Hopefully someday soon. But I’m sure I can save a berth for you and your flaxen-haired lovely. He’s told me he’d rather fancy being a pirate.“

"Really. Has he ever set foot on a ship?” The thought of Anders playing at being a pirate actually draws a smile across his lips. He can’t see it seriously at all. Still, he gets a little wistful at the idea. “I’d thought about it. I doubt I’ll ever feel peace from the slavers with anything less than the ocean.”

Isabela shrugs. "He came here from Ferelden. Nobody makes that journey over land. If he knows his way around the rigging, I’ve no idea, but it might be fun to teach him. As for the rest… think about it. I’m not going anywhere in the meantime. But I promise you, a berth on my ship when I have one, a spot on my crew when I gather it, and a freer life than any in Thedas, if you wish to sail with Captain Isabela.“

Fenris chuckles. "I’ll keep it in mind. It’s so much easier, isn’t it.” He pauses, possibly actually giving it thought, and adds after a moment, “Should I not, I expect you to stop here again in ten years.” He has a sinking feeling that otherwise they’ll never see each other again. Given the choice, the Anderfels would be the only other place Tevinter wouldn’t be inclined to bother him. He would have ran there first, had it not been so directly beside the Imperium’s borders to do so.

“Fenris.” Isabela lowers his voice, then slips off her stool to put her arms around him warmly. "I’m not leaving yet. I don’t have a ship or a crew. And when I do… I promise you I won’t leave without saying goodbye. Friendship, much like many people I can think of, goes both ways.“

Fenris freezes for a split second in surprise, then hooks an arm around her waist as he turns his head to regard her from this close. Damn his mossy emerald eyes, when they’re not squinted in midglare or otherwise distracted. "It’s been years. I want to be ready when the world pulls out from under my feet again.”

Isabela sighs, looking into those eyes and feeling her heart melt a bit in spite of herself. "What if… what if I told you… “ She drops her head forward, muttering "Maker…”  
“It’s not a promise or anything but… I’ve thought about… not leaving.”

He’s certainly not egotistical enough to think this decision has anything to do with him. So Fenris’ brows knit a bit at that in confusion, and with his normally somber expression, this new one comes off a bit… pouty. “Why?”

“It’s… it’s complicated.” Isabela hedges around the truth and looks away. "Alright, it’s /Hawke/. Look, don’t tell him I said anything. I don’t even he know he wants me around. But between ..whatever it is with him and then, you, Kitten, Varric… “

 

"Hawke?” Fenris’ eyebrows raise, more than they would have if he’d only noticed the Kitten nickname, and his arm around her waist loosens a few inches. Somehow it hadn’t occurred to him at all that they might… “…you don’t know? What happened?”

“I got… lonesome… so we shagged eachother raw, alright?” Isabela shrugs again. "And then I tried to tell him it was nothing. I’m not sure he believed me.. in fact I’m fairly sure he didn’t. But he hasn’t said anything about it since and now I don’t know /where/ things stand. I just… I shouldn’t have run. I wish I hadn’t, I wish I could take it back.“

"You should talk to him.” So easily said when it’s not like Fenris has ever gone to the man about personal reasons. “I regret running away from Anders in the past, and you. Don’t lose Hawke if he’s what you want with mistakes I’ve already made.”

Isabela manages to meet Fenris’s gaze again. Her eyes shut as she bows her head in defeat. "You’re right of course. Andraste’s tits, I wish it wasn’t so difficult… If I hurt him I don’t know how I’ll live with myself.“

Fenris is silent for a few moments, mulling that possibility over in his mind. ”/Can/ you hurt Hawke? I’m not sure how you got him into bed in the first place.“ The man seems so… serious. Nice, but serious. The thought of it seems a bit like fucking a mountain.

"Just because he doesn’t show it easily doesn’t mean it can’t be done,” Isabela sighs. "You and I know that.“ A pause, and Isabela leans in, giving Fenris a tight hug and a kiss below the ear. "I’ll talk to him. And you, come to me if you need me and don’t be shy about it. You’re an untapped goldmine of sexual fantasies now, you know.”

“I already do.” In case it wasn’t obvious, him being here with an arm wrapped around her waist that would likely make Hawke burn with jealousy if he wasn’t already well aware the elf was very actively taken. “That was… nice, until the last sentence.” Fenris’ smirk has faded into a actual, albeit small, real smile though. “I’m afraid to ask what you already have written out in your mind.”

“Oh, just a little tidbit about your flaxen-haired lovely biting his pillow while you ram into him as hard as you ever did me. That pretty voice of his breathless and begging, your balls slapping against his buttocks and a good spray of pearly jism right over the small of his back at the end– what, you /asked/!” Isabela grins as she lets Fenris slip out of her embrace. 

Fenris’ face drops to his palm, but none of it is nearly enough to conceal just how hard he’s blushing. If anything he’s slightly turned toward her to hide from the general public. “Thank you for that enlightening moment. I think.” And he can’t even protest it too much, with.. what a good idea it was. “How you manage to say those things in public is beyond my understanding.” But likely has to do with how she doesn’t have a penis to keep down.

“It’s only because I always travel with a change of knickers.”

Fenris groans at that comment. Knickers is the last, last thing he needs on his mind right now. “I should go, before I regret anything.”

Isabela makes sure to pat Fenris’s rear as he’s on the way out. "Give Anders my love!“


	20. Chapter 20

For once, Fenris hadn’t gone to the usual night of diamondback, but somehow had managed to convince Anders to go on without.  
He’d told himself that it was just no use to play if he was going to be sweeping the rug out from his own boyfriend. But the truth of it was if he was going to spend time frustrated and cursing at a book, he wanted to do so alone so he wouldn’t embarrass himself. It meant he wouldn’t have anyone to tell him what a word was, but this just made him try harder until he skipped it or figured it out with context.  
It also meant he could sit in the study, chair pulled back from the desk so he could just prop a book in hand, where the best remaining lamp to read by diffused the small flame into lighting the whole room. It was.. odd, how much he didn’t feel welcome in here, practically slinking in and not touching any of Anders’ mess of paper and books he’d brought with him.

It’s well past midnight when the door creaks open, and a murmur of voices crosses the threshhold:

“–’Ll be pissed if we wake him, he'sh got to be sleeping already.”  
“Tch, he’ll be more pissed if I let him miss out. Now don’t be a baby, I’ve kept you nice and drunk the whole way up, just like you asked.”  
“Dunno what you think he’ll get out of it, you know he makes me scream at least twice a day already. Must get jaded to it after a while.”  
“Shut up and drink, Anders.” Isabella shoves an open flask into his hand and the mage quaffs a bit more sour whiskey. He’s still standing on his own when they enter the manor’s main atrium, but he’s blurred and flushed with drink.

Fenris jumps at the noise, though he immediately recognizes the voices, even when they’re quiet and the words are blurred together between this many walls. He takes short note of the page numbers as he shuts the book, even if he forgets offhand what 6 stands for, and shuts it as he stands. The chair is forgotten but he blows out the lamp and leaves the room, quick to make his way into the side hallway well before anyone can notice where he was, and leaves the book on one of the dusty pieces of hall furniture before he turns the corner to almost too casually find Anders and Isabela. “I trust he’s still in one piece.”

“Not for long,” Anders dolefully proclaims.  
“Baby.” Isabela rolls her eyes and shakes her head. "Good, you’re awake, Fenris. I need you to help me collect Anders’s debt.“ She grabs Anders by the belt and begins hauling him toward the kitchen, cackling wickedly. Anders stumbles along behind, drinking from the borrowed flask.

Something about the kitchen that even a besotted mage can’t help on his own with… is a tad bothersome, when it involves Isablea’s clear amusement. He follows, reluctant and only because something he cares about is being tagged along, and narrows his eyes. "If it involves his internal organs, no.” Because that’s the only thing he can imagine from the situation so far.

“Nothing like that, lovely,” Isabela laughs, and Anders’s cheeks become a bit redder under the alcohol flush. "I’m giving him a present, actually. Once upon a time in Denerim dear Anders lost a wager to me and paid it with a golden earring. When he ran out of things to wager in Diamondback I told him he could have it back… “  
"But if I lost the hand, Isabela would get to choose -where-,” Anders finishes. Once in the kitchen, Isabela goes about lighting the lamps, and Anders begins to unfasten the many fastenings of his coat.

Fenris just blinks as he slows to a stop at the doorframe, shoulder drifting a few inches to lean on the stone. “I fail to see what this has to do with me, unless I get a say in what you do to his body.” He realizes late what this sounds like, and glances down awkwardly as he flushes.

“Of course you do… and if you like what we’ve settled on, I’m going to need you to get him up, and then hold him down.” Isabela’s smile is catlike and filled with mischief. Anders, while looking flustered and a bit bashful over this plan, doesn’t seem exactly unwilling either. His robes come off, and his tunic after. Isabela perches on the edge of the kitchen table and pulls one of the smaller gold hoops from her ear.

It takes him a moment, but the underlying meaning in Isabela’s reply dawns on him, and it really doesn’t help matters. He snaps a bit defensively, moreso than he’d even intended. “He can’t do that well enough on his own?!” Fenris goes a little quiet at that, realizing he’s being a bit silly. It’s not like all three of them haven’t messed around, just that it wasn’t all at the same time and place.

Fenris hisses under his breath a quiet “/vae/…” as he shoves away from the door to come closer. Might as well, if they’re going to do this with or without him.

“That’s the spirit!” The smile Isabela turns towards Fenris is mysterious and full of veiled promises. "And given how much he drank after he lost that hand? Sparklefingers is going to need all the help he can get.“  
Anders exhales slowly, and after Isabela pats the surface of the kitchen table, he lays down along the grooved wood. "From now on it’s strip diamondback for me -only-,” Anders mutters as he unlaces his breeches and pushes them down.  
“But think how very surprised everyone will be the next time you lose at it.” Isabela chuckles richly.

Fenris props his elbow along the counter, and lets his brow prop against his hand as he grumbles. “debes me, utrumque vestrum.” He raises his free hand to the mage’s stomach, not so immediately eager to work over his boyfriend’s dick in anyone’s company even if it’s Isabela, a finger idly brushing the edge of the small trail of hair starting there. His eyes raise up past his fingers. “You’re sure about this?”

Anders actually moans softly at that touch. Awkward circumstances or not, somehow, when Fenris lays a hand on him, the rest of the world may as well disappear. He looks back at Fenris with a small, nervous smile. "I’ve always thought of having this done. I suppose I just needed a nudge.“  
"A bottle of whiskey is more than a nudge, lovely.”  
“A shove, then. But a friendly one.”  
“A very friendly one,” Isabela confirms. She leans in to watch, rather than trying to make herself unobtrusive.

Fenris shoots her a tiny glare, a parting warning of how fast he could back out of this. His loose facepalm drops to slip under Anders’ head and the elf leans forward to press their lips together, the strong smell of alcohol hitting his nose immediately. It’s the only way he could imagine to try ignoring the fact that Isabela’s there. He blindly lowers past the trail and tips the man’s shaft up into an easier position as his palm curls around it, grip firm as his hand rocks in a steady pumping motion.

The kiss Anders returns is a bit breathless, a bit sloppy, but he focuses and reigns it in. His eyes are half shut as his lips work against Fenris’s, and his body seems to relax in the partial embrace Fenris holds him in. In Fenris’s hand, his dick stirs and begins to stiffen responsively. And Isabela moves silently around the table, drawing a slim, hollow needle from a hiding place under her bracer.

Fenris pulls away to trail his lips along Anders’ jaw, trailing up the edge and pausing near his ear to whisper things he assumes the man is far too drunk to even begin to understand. “interdum odio, amans. quid amo te…” With his minor frustrations growled out he travels down the man’s neck, pausing over the middle of his throat to lightly suck at the skin there. Plus, it’s a good place to glance up, watching Isabela out of the corner of his eye.

“Qu–quia te cocum et i-impune occidere,” Anders answers in a hoarse, stammering whisper. His accent is …strong, to put it mildly, but it’s improved enough to be intelligible.   
His dick is hard under Fenris’s palm, and Isabela gives a soft murmur: “Hold him.”  
She works quickly. The needle flashes, presses in, and Anders roars in pain as it punches through. Another moment of tugging at the wound, and the gold hoop is in place, the needle removed. Isabela holds a clean rag tight over the bleeding wound while Anders moans in pain through clenched teeth.

Fenris moves his hand away, leaving Anders’ erection to hold down his shoulder. When he really puts his mind to it, his hand is like a steel weight.“/Quiescite/, sonantis es.” He raises his head back to kiss the mage’s lips again, muffling the sound at least for a few moments.

“So demanding,” Anders mutters as he struggles to catch his breath. Every pull around the new piercing is a wave of duller pain, and he reaches down with one hand and closes it around his wounded tip. His magic rises around that hand like a cold fog, and Anders begins to breath a bit easier.  
“Well? Let’s see it.” Isabela perches on the edge of the long table again, watching the pair with quiet interest and trying not to smirk too obviously.  
Anders opens his hand and pulls away the now bloody rag. The piercing is healed cleanly, a gold ring stands out from his tip, buried in the underside just below the head and then emerging from his slit.

Fenris smirks a little at Anders’ reply, and releasing the man’s shoulder as he straightens. This is so beyond his concepts of things a person would willingly to do to themselves. Not that it looks bad, something he’s wary to admit to himself. “You’d wanted to do this… why?”

Anders sits up, any remaining shakiness the result of alcohol and the rush of endorphins that come after such a sudden burst of pain. “I like how it looks,” he says, looking down. His softening cock stiffens up again as he admires his new adornment. “And I always wondered how much it would hurt. It’s like having a naughty secret no one knows.”  
Isabela kisses the tips of her fingers as she admires her handiwork. “C'est magnifique! A work of art. And now I shall bid you boys goodnight, change my knickers, and show myself out.”

Fenris props his hand between Anders’ shoulderblades as the mage sits up, as absently strong a supportive touch as he was a restraint moments ago, and he gives a parting glance to Isabela as she leaves. He’d say thanks, but.. that would be a lie. So instead her leaving just gets a polite pointed notice, before he looks down and drops his forehead to lean against the mess of blonde hair. “You’re mad. The only secret we have now is that you’ve put a ring in your cock.”

Isabela’s parting smile seems to say “You’ll thank me later.” Her fingers wiggle in a wave as she turns and stalks off, pointedly leaving her flask behind.  
“Not mad, love, just very drunk. And Isabela was so happy over the idea, how could I disappoint her?” Anders shuts his eyes and leans against Fenris slightly, his awareness drifting to the hand on his back, and then to the way Fenris had slipped an arm under his head and kissed him, the delicious feeling of being sheltered and protected that had come with that. "I hope you’re not too put out with me over it.“

Fenris outright chuckles at that, the sound quieting to a short hum as he tilts his head to rest his lips loosely against Anders’ brow. “Why? Any problems it causes will frustrate you more than me.” He reaches down with his free hand, perches one finger on the top edge of the metal, and very carefully rolls his finger forward to rock the loop in it’s seat.

 

Forehead kisses! Anders feels his heart nearly levitate into his throat at that soft nudge of a kiss from Fenris, but that subtle swirling tug -down there- distracts him immediately. A warm puff of air leaves his lips with an almost silent moan. "You can keep doing that,“ Anders breathes.

Fenris hadn’t honestly intended anything by it, beyond the fact that he’ll have to get used to the ring as another part of the mage’s dick now, but the unexpected excitement makes him pause. His cheek presses against the skin his lips had been resting on as he turns his head downward to pay more attention to what he’s doing. His palm sinks to wrap around the upper half of Anders’ shaft, holding it in place as his fingers brace along the upper edges of the tip, and the single fingerpad presses back down on the piercing, mimicking the movement he’d just idly done in a more purposeful way, softly grinding the metal against it’s sheath.

The friction is a soft and subtle tease, but still impossible to ignore. A few drops of precum well up in Anders’s now crowded slit, and the ring moves even more easily for its slickness. Anders looks down at himself, at Fenris’s hand and its oddly graceful pose as it grasps him and worries at his piercing. He supposes it shouldn’t surprise him. Everything Fenris does, he does with an unusual amount of poise and grace.

Fenris’ fingers shift forward a few inches, his thumb sliding onto the slit and holding the ring steady a moment as his forefinger casually draws down the loop then along the shaft, marvelling at the difference. It’s teasing and he knows it, but he doesn’t seem to particularly care. "I talked to Isabela earlier.” Far, far earlier, before this nonsense. “That you mentioned sailing once. Seems.. fitting.”

“A better pirate accessory than a peg leg or a hook for a hand,” Anders laughs breathlessly. His dick flexes gently in Fenris’s grip, responsive to the slow teases of Fenris’s slender fingers. "It’s true… when I left the Wardens I tried to lay a false trail, that I’d taken ship from Amaranthine and I was planning to join Captain Isabela’s crew. It’s the kind of thing I would have enjoyed, before.“

Fenris lets his hand fall farther forward, cupping his palm over the head and letting the new piercing rest between his fingers. "She mentioned that she might stay here… but I thought about it. I still am.”

“Have you ever been to sea before?” Anders doesn’t know why he suddenly feels uneasy, but when he shuts his eyes, he thinks he can see the image of a great ship putting out to sea. He can’t leave Kirkwall. It’s out of the question. But Fenris could. He could be happy with Isabela… just like he was in the past.

“Danarius took me to Seheron several times, but I never manned it. I just watched before I was able to finally leave.” Watched, and had decided he couldn’t man the entire slaverunner ship on his own, no matter how much he willed it before they came into port. He smirks faintly at the idea, oblivious to the sinking feeling Anders is getting, unable to notice his expression when the elf’s cheek is propped against the man’s forehead, until he catches something. “Before what?”

“…Justice,” Anders says simply. As his mind wanders down that particular road, his cock begins to soften under Fenris’s hand.

Fenris lets out a voiceless breath of air, an odd mix between a sigh and a small hiss through his teeth, He lets his hand drop away, and straightens, the only real touch left the hand on Anders’ back. “I wasn’t aware demons got seasick.” The half joke runs flat, sounds less than impressed that Justice would take issue with something like this.

“He doesn’t. He just also doesn’t care for thieving on the high seas or frivolous things like adventure for its own sake. He’s /also/ not a demon.” It’s been a long time since Anders has harped on that particular point, but for some reason it seems like the right time to take up the cause again. Remember who his real allies are, the ones who will never leave him, the only one who will never leave him. Justice is his friend, after all, he shouldn’t let others speak ill of him.

“He is as long as you are his gain.” But for once in a lifetime Fenris doesn’t sound like he’s in the mood for this battle, this time, and shifts the weight in his hand in a silent coaxing to get the mage out of the kitchen. Nothing like having your lover storm in at the wee hours, drunk, get a piercing and start going off about bloody mages and defending the demon. Again, and his mild impatience is apparent. “You should sleep.”

Anders feels the pressure at his back, but there’s a greater pressure in his chest, oppressive, refusing to be ignored. He slides off the table, fastens his breaches and pulls his tunic off the floor. "Not tonight,“ he says curtly, the irritation in Fenris’s voice only grating at him. If he’s going to be angry about Anders standing up for himself, he can stay angry, he tells himself. He storms out of the kitchen without a single backward glance, heading for his study.

Fenris stands there a moment, watching him storm off. Not that long ago, he wouldn’t have hesitated in his choice of how to react to that. Leave him to whatever lunacy it is now. It’s the old wood settling, popping above him like pin drops, that snaps him out of it. He curses under his breath as he eventually follows back to the study, where he’d left the chair well-ajar and the lamp dragged well-closer to the back edge of the desk. "Haven’t you had enough today?”

Anders looks down at his desk, noticing that things have been moved, puzzled what Fenris would find engaging in what he’s been referring to as “nonsense.” He looks up to see Fenris in the doorway and the expression on Anders’s face is strange, drawn and grim. Inside, he feels as if he’s being torn in half. "I /can’t/,“ he says, halting, looking for words he can’t find. He gestures, his hands at the level of his heart. "I… there’s just… too much.” He shakes his head, and tries again. "..Too much, inside. All I’d do is lie awake and keep you up. At least one of us should sleep.“

Fenris watches Anders’ response imperceptibly, gaze flicking down over his agitated motions and the paperwork on the desk. The man has a point, though regardless of whether the elf would get any sleep, dragging him to bed would just postpone this… possession. Because that’s what this really is, isn’t it. For a split second he looks defeated, before turning away. "Don’t write on anything important, they’ll mistake your drinking for more madness.” And he leaves, presumably for bed, leaving the mage to those words and the dusty silence of the mansion. With the bare footfalls silent against the marble floors, it’s like he was never there. At least one of them will get some sleep tonight.  
He returns a moment later, book retrieved from where he’d left it, and settles onto the floor to find his page in one of the few spots that both doesn’t look like it’s going to be filled anytime soon with a wall to lean against that isn’t a bookshelf.

Anders looks up from his books when Fenris returns. He says nothing as the elf settles into a spot on the floor – he simply watches, perplexed, and then returns to flipping through pages and scratching out notes. The agitation in him feels palpable. His breathing is labored, and he fidgets endlessly while he works, tapping a foot, shoving his hands through his hair, rising up to pace around his desk, and Fenris, so silent, fades to the background of his awareness. Hours pass. For an unusual span of unbroken quiet, Anders sits hunched over a book, braced with his forehead resting on both hands. And very quietly, he begins to sob. His hands are tense against his head, clenching until his knuckles show white, holding and pulling fistfulls of his hair.

Fenris had been silent, and honestly only half paying attention to reading the words on the pages in front of him, much less what the sentences were actually saying. It’s hard, watching and just sitting idly by. Every change in the man’s agitation just renews the elf’s unease for Justice, just as much that he feels it likely easiest to just let the madness ride itself out.  
But it’s when he hears the crying that he discreetly glances up again, and decides enough is enough. The book drops to his lap, as he raises his head and props it against the wall behind him, the marble cold on the tip of one ear. “Anders.”

“I can’t do this anymore…” Anders chokes on the words. "It must be done but I can’t do this anymore… I don’t want this anymore…“ Justice is railing against him, riding him and holding tight to every hand-hold his self-loathing provides, sawing at the reigns. The recriminiations won’t stop. Slothful, frivolous, weak. You wanted this, Anders, you wanted Justice for the mages. You wanted my help. That is what I’m giving you. I am helping you achieve something with your life. What else is there for you? A life spent running, hiding, every moment lived in fear? You have no future. You cannot delude yourself any longer, that this is a life you can keep. This is a distraction. This is nothing but a stop along the way.

"And you tell me not to call it a demon.” Fenris closes the book in his hand. “Come here. Bring your cursed work if it forces you to.”

Anders pushes his work aside and stumbles around the desk, almost blind with tears. Why do you cling to him this way? But for all that he tries to, it’s impossible for Justice to insinuate that Fenris will abandon him when the elf is here, now, offering comfort in spite of everything. Anders drops to his knees before Fenris and bows his head. Why do you deny me? I sought to give you all that I am. And I sought to give you a life, Justice, and a home. To do what you bid, the way you bid me, would destroy both.

Fenris sits up, reaches out with his free arm and hooks it around the back of Anders’ neck, and pulls to topple the mage and drop his head to the elf’s chest. His strength in that single movement is like gently moving steel again, any give an active choice and instant against any struggle, but in it’s own way a silent challenge against ‘the demon’ in the only way he can. And, comfortable, he props his book open to keep reading. They can keep fighting inside all they want, now.

Anders falls into Fenris’s arms with no resistance. He can feel Justice let him go, and the retreating echoes of confusion, frustration, futility. He has the strength that he could fight this pull Fenris exerts over Anders. But Anders manages to make him question whether he even wants to, whether he should. It should be clear. It always used to be. But how can he go on twisting this knife in Anders’s heart? How can he go on using guilt and pain and anger to flog the man he aimed to help into submission? Anders rests with a tearstained cheek on Fenris’s chest, his breathing ragged and shuddering. “Fenris.”

Fenris’ arm relaxes as Anders doesn’t pull away, and he lets the grip sink into a loose embrace across Anders’ shoulders. In a way he wishes he could scream at the man to fight it, but he knows it won’t do anything. Anders has to win this for himself, or not at all, and the best he can do is sit on the sidelines and silently be there to clean up the aftermath. He flips the page on his book with a thumb. “Mmm?”

“What is justice, to you? Punishing the wicked, or bringing comfort to the wounded? Or some balance of both? Is it possible to forgive without… without it just being surrender?” Anders’s voice is soft but rough. His breathing steadies, though, settling into an uneasy calm. “If it were possible… if you had the choice… would you see every mage burn for what was done to you, or would you choose to have your marks erased and your past restored to you and your freedom guaranteed to you for all time. If you could choose absolute revenge, or absolute healing, which would you wish for yourself?”

Fenris pauses, the spine of his book swaying back as his wrist loosens and his head drops back against the cool wall. He nearly responds with an outright refusal, that he’s terrible at these situations, but he stops himself before a word of it is out, and actually puts some thought into his response. The man deserves that much, even if it’s uncomfortable. “I’m not where you should be looking for answers. I’ve never claimed to have any noble agenda, my answer should be obvious. Would it bother you if I intend to kill mages until the day I die?”

“If you intend to kill them only for being mages… yes. Yes, it would bother me, and I would not be able to accept that. I just… I ask you because I have no one else to ask, Fenris.” Anders turns his head, pressing his face against Fenris’s chest, and he breathes a heavy sigh. “I only know I cannot continue like this. There isn’t room in my heart for this much anger and this much love. It’s tearing me appart.”

Fenris sighs with some small irritation. Fine, he’ll answer. “Justice kills the wicked so they can’t harm anyone else. The wounded have no time for your pity.” Clearly some of that opinion is personal. “You can’t chase after demons to just pick up the scraps they leave behind. Did you honestly think otherwise?”

“I hoped… there was some other way.” Anders closes his eyes. “I’m sorry.”

Fenris smirks a little, humorlessly. “Don’t agree with me. It’s not like you.”

That actually makes Anders chuckle very quietly. “You’re quite right, of course,” he teases.

Fenris shifts his weight under Anders, and raises a hand to lightly rap him on the head with his knuckles. “Damn mage.”

“I am not worthy of your mercy, Serrah Fenris.” Anders lifts his head a bit to look up at Fenris with exaggeratedly wide, vulnerable eyes.

….Yeah, he’s better. Fenris gives a very mild glare back, and moves his arm down to shove Anders away. All the purposeful strength in his movements is gone, though. “Get off, I’m trying to read.” Emphasis on trying.

“Get off? But I’m not even breathing hard.” Anders pulls back and rises to his feet. He winces – between the lack of sleep and the abundance of drink, his head is starting to pound. “I’m going to bed. Why don’t you bring your reading along, I don’t mind if you leave a lamp burning.” He starts to hold out a hand, then regretfully lets it drop back to his side. “Thank you, love, for being here.”

Fenris flips the book closed, and just leaves it propped against the wall as he gets up. At this point of the morning, he’s not going to pass up on sleep when they get to the bed. “I am at your side.” There’s a simple honesty to it, that he doesn’t even bat an eye as he stretches his shoulderblades and leads them out, and he adds, “Someone has to keep you from listening to him all the time.”

Anders follows close behind… but far enough that he can quietly appreciate Fenris’s rear end as they climb the stairs. “No, no one actually does have to do that. But you do.”

This is so easy a personal niche to fall into, and at the doorway to the bedroom Fenris half-turns back, already idly fingering at the first clasp of his top. “It would be hard not to, you might start looking like an abomination too.”

“You mean you wouldn’t love me any more if I had a hunchback and fleshy pulsating tumors all over?” Anders gives Fenris another sad-eyed look. He has his tunic off and tossed over one shoulder. He notices something blue hanging over one of the posts at the top of the stair rails, and realizes what it must be. “Oh, look, Isabela left us a present.”

Fenris takes a deep breath, casual enough but for a split moment going through what would happen in his mind. “I would, but our sex would be over and you wouldn’t be around much longer.” At Anders’ words his sentence trails off and he follows the mage’s gaze to land on… oh. “Lovely.” He finishes the last clasp on his top, but leaves it hanging open instead of immediately pulling it off. “We could post it by the door. I always did want a crest flag.”

Anders takes the remaining stairs two at a time, bounding up to Fenris with a grin on his face. “Agreed, I think it suits our rather unique household.” He lunges in to press a wet, shamelessly affectionate smooch on the side of Fenris’s jaw.

Fenrris catches the railing to steady himself from outright toppling over in surprise, and catches the man’s waist to drag him into the bedroom. Isabela’s panties can just make decor right where they are. “If I’d known they’d excite you this much, I would’ve had her come by sooner.”

“What, the knickers? No, love, this is just the wages of you being absolutely delightful.” Anders lets Fenris sweep him into the bedroom. He tosses his tunic over the back of a chair and pushes his trousers down, kicking them away before he dives into bed.

Fenris finally shrugs out of his top and leaves it haphazardly on the armor and sword resting on the table. “We just talked about you becoming more of an abomination than you already are, how is that delightful?” He peels out of his leggings, pulling one foot up and then the other, and lightly tosses them as he turns, smalls still on out of habit than anything else. His crash against the bed at Anders’ side is more controlled but a fall all the same, and for a moment he’s content to just lie on his stomach and face planted into a pillow. “That’s the first time since I escaped I’ve spent a day without armor on..”

“But you would still love me. How can that not make me happy?” Anders rolls onto his side, his gaze wandering along the sleek curve of Fenris’s back. “Don’t worry, I won’t let myself go just to make you prove it. I would really miss having a mouth. Justice would too, he’s pretty fond of summer sausage, and barleywine.” And your tattoos, Anders neglects to add. “A day without armor, and nothing especially terrible happened…”

“This time. Don’t get used to it.” There’s something underlying and uneasy in those words, that he’d made a genuine effort but still felt uncomfortable even trying to relax. And speaking of, for all of the effort it took to get the damn mage to the bed. “…and at this point I can’t imagine I’m going to sleep tonight.” He rolls over to his back, propping a hand against his brow to rub his eyelids.

“I could… help,” Anders offers. His gaze wanders over Fenris’s front side now, lingering at the crest of his hip and the joint of his thigh. How did he ever get so lucky, to have someone this gorgeous sharing a bed with him? The novelty still hasn’t worn off. When his eyes meet Fenris’s again, they’re filled with sleepy tenderness.

“After all that I’d rather you sleep already.” Fenris realizes late that his usual quip was very much the wrong answer this time and his eyes snap open, fingers stopped along the high bridge of his nose, to glance over. “It’s not that, I’m.. It’s just that…” He gives up and sighs as he closes his eyes again and sinks his palm to his face, hiding the faint blush of embarrassment at how fumbling and awkward he feels. “I’m sorry. I just have a lot on my mind. Come here.” Mostly to himself, he adds a small grumble. “Maybe I’ll stop worrying if I use a handsome man as a blanket.” Sounds like as good a plan as any.

“Unfortunately you’ll have to settle for me,” Anders parries as he scoots closer. He does sneak in a brush of the side of his hand against Fenris’s cheek as he snuggles in close and settles with an arm and a leg draped across the elf’s lithe body. “I love you,” he murmurs without preamble. Nuzzling against Fenris’s shoulder, Anders shuts his eyes.


	21. Chapter 21

(ed. note: This scene begins soon after Hadriana’s death.)

Anders slips into the commonroom at the Hanged Man, shadowed by a cloak and cowl. The last of the daylight has faded outside. the streets won’t keep clear for much longer, and Anders has been itching to go out in search of Fenris ever since returning from the Wounded Coast. Unfortunately he’s had other business to attend to, and Fenris’s wellbeing isn’t the only thing for him to mind. He should probably be rehearsing how he’s going to tell Fenris about the change he’s made to their makeshift household, but his thoughts refuse to stay focused on that for very long. He’s more concerned about whether he’ll find Fenris here as he expects to, and whether he’ll be able to get him to talk.

Isabela is on her usual perch at the bar, turned outward to watch the crowd, casual but perhaps a bit pointedly. She’s paying attention enough that she spots Anders even under the coverup right as he walks into the tavern, and with a quick wave and point she silently directs him to Varric’s in back. Her little mission accomplished she spins back to the barkeep, tapping her empty mug for a refill.  
In the dwarf’s paid room, Varric is at the table where they always play cards, shuffling his deck back into place, and a passed out elf on the opposite side. “Ah, was wondering when you’d show. I warn you Blondie, he’s gonna have one hell of a headache when he comes to.”

“Aaah, love,” Anders murmurs when he sees a silver-haired head on Varric’s table. He paces over to the chair where Fenris is passed out, and he falls into a loose crouch, lifting a finger to his lips to shush Varric. “Actually, he’ll be mysteriously lacking a hangover. And let’s keep that mystery between us.” Anders’s magic is a soft, barely visible mist of blue that weaves between his slender fingers. He rests his hand on the back of Fenris’s head, not clearing the alcohol from his system, or bringing him back to consciousness, but slowly, gently erasing the physical footprints of anguish and hardship and too much drink. This will be the most restful passing-out anyone has ever had. “Varric, thank you.”

Fenris is still the same mess he was when he left the slaver’s den on his own. Spats of blood here and there, most of it thankfully not his, his hair a bit messier than usual and the sword strapped to his back leaning in it’s restraints, the gold lining of his clothes highlighting the strip of exposed skin along his spine.  
Varric waves a hand. “Don’t thank me, I /mighta/ had a hand in making sure he stays down. Now I can feel less guilty about it. You should check him for anything else you can fix when you get home, he got here on a bit of a limp.”

Anders closes his eyes. He spends a long moment with his lips against the back of Fenris’s neck, just breathing in the smell of his hair, feeling his pulse. His eyes are bright when he opens them again and raises his head, just a hint of standing tears. His hands reach for the buckles on Fenris’s sword, loosening the baldric and then pulling it away, draping it over the back of his chair. “I’ll come for it tomorrow. I’m not going to be able to carry him to Hightown with it still on him. Thank you for not leaving him alone.” Anders begins to pull Fenris into his arms,carefully settling his head against his shoulder, and then lifting him, cradled against his chest. The slender elf weighs more than Anders expected, but he thinks he’ll still be able to get him home. He doesn’t have much choice available, anyhow. “I’d stay, but I don’t want to be on the streets when the nightlife starts to come out.”

Fenris is so far gone he doesn’t stir in the slightest, completely limp and the only indication of life the fiery heat of too much drinking and the slow breath slipping past his lips.  
Varric simply nods. “It’ll be right where you left it tomorrow. Oh, but hold on.” The dwarf gets up from his seat, dropping the fresh and boxed deck of cards to the table as he crosses to Bianca a couple chairs over. With a quick reach down he pulls a large dagger from a compartment, and offers it out. “I’m sure there’s something between you two, but just in case. Something tells me he won’t like waking up with his sword across town.”

Anders nods, and manages to tuck the dagger into his belt. “I owe you,” he says, with a sheepish smile saying that if he were to thank Varric as much as he deserves, he’d be here all night. “I’ll see you tomorrow, Varric. Sweet dreams.” With the barest sketch of a bow that Anders can manage with Fenris unconscious in his arms, he backs away, then turns and leaves. Keeping to the best-patrolled routes, Anders begins making his way back home to Hightown.

————–

It’s just past dawn when Fenris finally starts to come to, the light from the nearest window bothering his eyes enough to wake him up when normally he’d just roll over. Not that he hurts, he just feels like he’s been asleep for years. He drags himself to sit up in bed, carefully. For once no morning headache sets in, but all the same he drops his head down as he rests it in one hand, massaging his temples while he thinks over what happened yesterday.

Anders is fast asleep in bed beside Fenris, lying on his stomach with one arm hanging off the edge of the bed. Knight Captain Mewins is curled up on the pillow, snuggled against the top of the mage’s tousled blonde head. He looks restful, younger, in his sleep, with a tiny puddle of drool by his slack mouth. But if Anders is asleep in bed, why are there sounds of movement elsewhere in the mansion?

Fenris is momentarily too distracted, the foggier details of his memory clearing. From what sounds like the kitchen Anders is likely making breakfast or something else equally disarming. He sighs to himself at that, realizing that even his thoughts are beginning to sound smitten. It’s when he drops his hand to get up that he notices the mage is still right there.  
It raises the hair at the back of his neck on end, and his eyes shoot to where he always leaves his armor. The sword is definitely missing, and the blackout of memory last night plus passing out at the Hanged Man does nothing for his assurance of the situation. With a firm tap of his palm to Anders’ shoulder Fenris gets up, reaching for the smaller knife within reach as he cautiously heads out the door.

Anders stirs and mutters incomprehensibly when Fenris touches his shoulder. He rubs his eyes, and when he opens them, he sees the door standing open, and Fenris slinking through it in his smallclothes, holding a knife. And then, atop his head, Ser Mewins stretches luxuriously, paws flexing, and– “AAAAAAAAUGH, CLAWS! OWWWW!” A little tabby kitten goes streaking out of the room in a creamy-orange blur. "Andraste’s saggy left TIT, Ser Mewins.“ Anders flops onto his back, rubbing his scalp.

Fenris stops dead at the door, and just glares back. Well nevermind, he imagines they’re going to come running any second now. But for the few moments of his life that isn’t filled with slavers attacking him, he’s going to glare. "Yes, I also always make it a point to let everyone within earshot know exactly where I am so they have an easier time trying to kill us.”

“What are you talking about?” Anders grumbles as he sits up, pushing tangled hair out of his face. He contemplated telling Fenris that he has some discrete warding spells on every door and window in the mansion, but he continues to believe that what Fenris doesn’t know won’t hurt him. he hears the sound of something clattering in the kitchen, then, and a moment later a soft, feminine voice calls up the stairs. "Is everything alright M…messere Anders?“  
Anders covers his face with his palm. This is going to -suck-.

Fenris’ glare melts into sudden confusion, glancing back towards the stairs in disbelief as he recognizes the voice, and snapping back towards Anders with a low hiss. "Her?!” He tips his sad excuse for a weapon towards the mage in a small gesture. “You move in, make this place what it was and now you have slaves for /anything you need./”

“Is that what you think? You think I’m a slaver, now? Truly?” Anders raises his head, eyebrows lifted over still-groggy eyes. "I’m paying her a standard wage. She has nowhere to go and no one to turn to. Hawke would have taken her in but I thought she would be better off with someone who could understand what she’s going through. Namely, you. I wanted to talk to you about it last night, but you were…“

Fenris still eyes Anders with a genuine wariness, probably a bit more than he should, before he lowers the dagger and half-turns his head to either listen to where she is in the house or hide his embarrassment. ”…right.“ Past that unease, his eyes trail down to what’s in his hand, finally noticing it’s design. His shoulders slump when he does, realizing the agitation he still feels is unwarranted. "This is Varric’s. I assume that’s where my sword is?”

“Yes. I couldn’t carry you with it strapped to your back. I’ll go fetch it for you.”  
“..Anders? Ser?”  
“Everything’s fine Orana, and thank you for cooking!” Anders leans over the balustrade and calls down to her. She doesn’t reply, not really knowing what to say when someone thanks her, and she returns to work. Pushing his fingers through his hair again, Anders slouches back into the bedroom and begins gathering his clothes, getting dressed.

Fenris flips the dagger against the hip of his smalls, ignores the cold metal as he moves past Anders. “I’ll go. You’d probably hurt yourself if you tried.” His words seem to go out of their way to be sharp, distract from what’s really bothering him as he reaches for his clothes.

Anders eyes Fenris for signs of the limp that Varric mentioned, and sure enough, there’s something a bit gingerly in the way the elf moves. "Not with that limp, love.“ His tone is groggy but mild… compared to what he was expecting, Fenris is taking things fairly well, and no matter how hard he tries he can’t quite stop being amused at the idea of Fenris, ready to take on a party of slavers in nothing but his smallclothes. There’s a smirk tugging at the corners of his mouth, heedless of his attempts to subdue it.

Fenris stops, resting a hand against the edge of the table. He’d been trying to ignore the ache in his leg, and somehow pointing it out sets him off. "I didn’t ask for your permission, mage. Do you have any idea how to have a servant? Do you think you can /afford/ her? This isn’t a game you can lose, wave your hands at to fix or run away from.”

“No, I have no idea what to do with a servant. No, I can’t afford her and still afford to eat, but it won’t be the first time I’ve gone hungry and I’ll be fine. As for the rest, I suppose you’d better help me, because if you leave it to me I will certainly fuck everything up even worse than I already have.” Anders pulls on his trousers, and then pulls his tunic over his head, weathering Fenris’s anger with relative calm.

Fenris huffs a short, humorless chuckle as he grabs his pants to put them on. Either way, he’s not exactly going to stay half naked when there’s someone else here. “So you’ll starve as a permanent solution. The abomination thinks things will work out magically, what a surprise.” He doesn’t even bother to wait to fasten his top, and turns to storm out as he works his way down the small closures.

“You know, no matter what you say, she’ll still be here when you get back. So if you’re running off to the Hanged Man, you might get yourself a room this time instead of passing out on Varric’s card table. Run away if you have to, but try not to impose on your friends more than you already do.” Anders’s tone is still calm, but carrying a curt, polite sharpness. The kind of tone that says “We both know who’s being the adult in this conversation.” He’s pulled his coat on and fastened the top buckles.

You know, that’s a good damn point. That he’s running just shows how much he’s uncomfortable in this clean mansion that now has it’s own servant. He stops, drops his hands to rest on the guardrail at the top of the stairs. “Get out.”

Anders takes his staff from where it rests against the wall and walks away, brushing past Fenris without a word. His footfalls can be heard for a moment before the front door shuts behind him.

Fenris glares towards the entrance of the mansion for longer than he’d honestly care to admit. But everything about the mansion gets under his skin right now, from quiet sounds of a nearby slave doing their daily chores to the study to the cat in the bedroom. Nothing changes. Every time he’s reminded of it, the more the idea of giving up and heading for Par Vollen seems like a viable plan. It’s almost convenient, now that he knows a Rivaini that would be familiar with that water.  
But he sighs and mentally shakes the idle thoughts out of his mind, and turns back into the bedroom to finish getting completely dressed, armor and all. The dagger is reseated into his belt, and he finally descends the stairs to see what Orana is doing and make his decision about her.

Orana is not up to anything terribly exciting or exotic. There’s a pot of something bubbling over the fire, and the somewhat gaunt elvhen girl is up to her elbows in soapy water as she scrubs last night’s dishes. While Anders had gotten the kitchen into clean and usable condition before, it’s distinctly -nicer- now somehow. Most of the pots seem to have been polished, the hearth swept out, and most of the dried goods and sundries are organized and tidy, all of a sudden. When Fenris enters the room, Orana quickly pulls her arms out of the washbasin and curtsies deeply. "Good morning, Ma– Messere… Fenris?“

For all that’s familiar Fenris glances up in surprise that he’s being addressed at all, much less like that, and as the mood is completely forgotten he waves his hands up in front of him. "No, uh.. just. Fenris.” The tips of his gauntlets curl a little as he realizes how awkward that was, and his hands fall as he clears his throat. “I wanted to talk to you, if you have a moment.” If she doesn’t she’ll make time, but it’s too hard to break habits.

“Alright…” There’s the beginning of a tiny hum as Orana catches herself in time to hold back another accidental “Master.” Anders was very clear on that topic, and she was proud of herself for minding her words. "May I take the porridge off the fire first? I don’t want the bottom to burn.“ She carries herself quite properly, her heels together, her shoulders square, her hands folded gracefully in front of her even as they drip onto her apron.

"Of course.” Fenris takes the moment her attention is turned to slump into a nearby stool, elbows sinking to the thick bare wood tabletop as his hands prop up his chin and shield his face under sharp plates of metal. “Do you want to be here?”

Orana lifts the pot off the fire with a hook, and sets it down on the hearth to cool . After a moment of indecision she sits down facing Fenris, her ankles crossed and her hands folded in that dainty position in her lap once more. She keeps her head bowed, though, not able to look Fenris in the eyes for very long. Her expression is troubled, and for a span of minutes, she works hard to even make sense of the question. "There isn’t anywhere else, now. Mistress is dead. And papa is dead. I don’t know how to go back to Minrathous, and… everyone would be so angry at me there. I’m… scared and I don’t want another Master. Anders… said I should think about what I want, but all I want is to see my papa again.“ Her face is tight with grief, but no tears fall. "Anders and the other man… Hawke… helped me give papa a pyre… as if he was a free man.”

Fenris sighs very deliberately, with no true clue as to how to handle this situation. He’s not the Fog Warriors, and she’s not him. His hands slip past his chin to rest against the wood. “You’re free too, now. You don’t have to be here, I could take you to the alienage. There’s someone I know there.” ‘Know’ is a strong word, and Merrill might be a danger to herself, but he imagines they would get along fine. Probably better than she will here.

“You don’t… want me here? I must be a burden. I’m sorry.” Orana hangs her head a bit lower, knowing that it isn’t enough to sound contrite – one has to look contrite, as well. "Does your friend need me to clean for him? And cook? I can sew a little bit, too, but I don’t know how to do anything else.“ Remembering something, Orana hesitantly raises her head. "Maybe I can do what you do. Anders and Hawke said that you were a slave once, and now you’re free.”

“No, you…” This is harder than he thought. Fenris takes her body language as her confirmation to stay, as initially hollow as it seems. And as stupid as it sounds, he hadn’t realized that.. he just does exactly what he used to do before. The back of his mind fuels with a quiet rage, that Tevinter stripped slaves down until they genuinely like doing their job and don’t even imagine anything else. But that makes the answer simple, then. “You’re free to go… but you can stay as long as you want.”

Orana considers that a moment, and from the serious gaze she returns to Fenris, she understands better than she did before. "Thank you. I… I want to see what the Alienage is like.. but I’ve never been outside on my own. I don’t want to get lost or cause trouble.“ In her lap, one hand squeezes the other as if she’s trying to comfort herself. "I want to stay for now. I don’t feel like I can be alone yet. Nothing… makes sense, yet.”

“…I know.” Frankly, she’s already doing better than he had. Fenris glances down at the grain under his silver gauntlets. He’s made a sort of peace here, but it doesn’t make him any less angry at Anders. Or give him any clue as to what to pay her with, save perhaps what he can win off Hawke during cards. Scant what he’d want to give… and none of it helps the fact that he still has no idea how to help her, either. He can’t even help himself. Well. “No one will get mad at you, here. And you’ll eat with us.”

Orana actually gives Fenris a winsome little smile at that, and she stands and smooths her skirts. "That reminds me, I should serve the porridge before it gets cold.“ She sets to work, ladling wheat porridge from the pot. When she returns with two bowls, the food has been rather artfully prepared, sprinkled with dried berries, a sprig of mint, and a swirl of cream… fit for a Magister’s table, in spite of the simple nature of the food. "I’m not as good at cooking as Papa was, but he taught me a few things.”

Fenris stares at the presentation for a moment. The Fog Warriors had a celebration once, but it was never quite as… diligently made as meals in Tevinter, and despite knowing what it all exactly looked like, it was a different matter entirely to have it sitting in front of him. “…thank you.” If anything is off with it he’d never know, but he can’t tell if it’s that or old instincts telling him that this is too good for him. He mentally shakes out of it, and looks up to change the topic for himself. “What were you doing with Hadriana?”

“Mistress brought papa and myself and two others to attend to her while we were on the voyage, and while she was here gathering hunters. I helped her bathe and dress, and I kept her rooms clean, before we went to the caves.” Orana gets a crestfallen look for a moment. “I tried to clean the caves too but it just made everyone laugh at me.” She sinks her spoon into the porridge, and suddenly there’s a glimmer in her eye. This is food for a master’s table. This would get her horribly punished if she was ever caught sneaking a taste, ruining a dish this lovely. But she’d snuck things before, when she’d helped papa in the kitchen. After all, how else were they to know when anything was seasoned right? So Orana lifts the spoon her mouth, closes her lips around it, and shuts her eyes. “Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm!”

Fenris glances up at her reaction, surprised by the small outburst but… not really. He realizes all too well how odd it must be to do something without being told first. It’s dizzying. It makes him smile despite himself, and the fact that he still has no idea what he’ll do when the mage returns. "If you’re going to cook, you decide the meals.“ It’s little things that it took longest for him to realize, and he likes the idea of her realizing she can eat anything they can afford.

"Then I decide we will have fried cheese sandwiches for supper. And tomato soup with basil and cream, because I have to use the rest of the cream or it will spoil.” Orana is smiling, chin propped on the heel of her hand as she stirs her porridge. “Do you like it? I wish Anders had stayed, I made plenty for even a human. I hope you like it… you’ve been very kind.” She doesn’t know how to put into words that Fenris’s apparent calm and strength makes her believe she can find such things in herself as well.

“It’s fine.” As much as Fenris sounds like he means it, the mention of Anders sends his mind right back into that mood he’d been sinking into, though it’s easy enough to hide by simply looking down and focusing on the breakfast. But he does end up grumbling. “The mage can find his own food.”

Orana abruptly straightens her posture and goes quiet, returning to her food. After so much time having to attune to the moods of those around her – people with more control over her fate than she has herself – all anger, even not directed at her, is frightening. So she returns to being as proper as she can… even while eating food that still tastes deliciously forbidden.


	22. Chapter 22

(ed. note: and the epic grande finale chapter of book 1! 8D well… if by book you mean I hit the boundary of the googledoc and was forced to start a new one. I think it’s a good ‘book 1’ type end though -broody)

Fenris’ anger just grows more internalized as time passes, and things are pleasant if quiet with Orana, with her picking up full well that he needs to be left alone for the most part. There’s enough to clean anyway, and she’s never laughed at even if the mansion seems hellbent at trying to outdo the cave in some spots.  
Varric and Isabela had been by, separately, to retrieve Anders’ things. The elf had refused them, despite his own better judgement. If the mage wanted to remake Tevinter, it was going to stay put. He somewhat imagined that it made an impression on Orana, an elf defiantly refusing a mage have his work back unless he deemed it important enough to come by personally.

 

This time she’s gone though, with Merrill. As he’d predicted they got along well, and the blood mage had offered to take Orana out to experience the city and get a better handle of where it all is. In the guaranteed privacy Fenris finds himself in the study, slowly reading. It’s comforting, while he pushes off dealing with Anders directly.

Anders’s key turns in the latch.  
He’s done what he could to bury himself in work. The clinic always provided him with plenty to do, and he’d buried himself in it, healing all that he could until, exhausted at the end of the day, he’d given in and put the lanterns out. He had sent Varric, and then he had sent Isabela. Fenris still had books he needed. He had wanted to abide by Fenris’s wishes if his lover wanted nothing to do with him, since ordering him out of his house. After Isabela had returned empty-handed, though, something had changed, and respecting Fenris’s wishes no longer mattered. Anders was thankful for Justice’s presence. The spirit inside him would whisper to him that he was not as alone as he felt. That even without Fenris, he had a purpose, something to live for. Even if no one would ever thank him for it, it was right. He didn’t need others to recognize it in order for it to be so. He could carry on, it would be fine. Fenris was only a distraction along the way, anyhow.  
Anders steps across the mansion’s threshold, staff in one hand, knapsack slung across his back. This shouldn’t take long.

It’s odd, how Fenris couldn’t tell Anders’ footsteps apart from anyone else when it didn’t so much matter. This time though it sounds iconic, catches his attention from the book immediately though he’d barely noticed Orana’s presence sometimes, and makes him jump a mile. He’s instantly racked with hurt, something twisting deep in his core, and immediately feels stupid for it. What did he expect, that a mage was going to just get pissed and leave the books, and that would be that?  
Well… no, but the ellf had been hoping this was going to happen in a week or two, not within days.  
He gets to his feet and sets the book down on the desk, then leaves to step out of the study and meet Anders halfway. “What is it, mage.”

Anders looks at Fenris, only betraying any emotion for the first fraction of a second before his face seems to close in upon itself, and he regards the elf with a calm, dead-eyed stare. Fenris knows what he wants. It seems pointless to state any of it. But now, something bitter rises in his throat like a surge of bile, and he wonders, he thinks, if there’s anything he can do to make Fenris hurt as much as he does, right now. Then, his lips tightening to a tense line, he bows his head. There isn’t a murmur, a gesture, to betray as he inscribes in his mind, a glyph upon the vacant floor between them. “Fenris…” he murmurs hoarsely, almost innaudible… bait to bring him closer.

It doesn’t even take that much. What was a passionate force in his love flares and fuels his anger now, and the faintest words of his name are just the lynchpin in making him storm forward. But he stops, a couple feet too short, the lyrium seeming to light him in blue fire. If he went after the mage now he’s likely make a pass at the man’s heart, and he’s smart enough to keep himself away from something he’d regret. “/Answer me!/” Because it’s not about the books anymore, or else he would have given them to Varric.

Anders raises his head slowly, and the life that rekindles in his eyes is baleful. He bites the inner surface of his lip, wishing he could choose his words, wishing he could hold back pain and anger and be as cruel as he wants to, now. “I want the same thing I always have! I want you! Why did you do this to me? Why did you lie? I believed you! You said you could never push me away and I believed you! You -fucking- liar! You threw me away like I was nothing and now you;re keeping my things… why? So you can see for yourself how much it hurt?! YOU WIN! Are you satisfied?! You win, now let me go!”

“Won?!” Fenris would belt out a laugh, if he wasn’t so bitter. If he tried, now, something dark would dislodge and erupt from his chest. “Yes. I live in a spotless mansion at the side of a mage, with a cat roaming the halls and servants in the kitchen. Everything here is /exactly as I left it in the Imperium./” He gestures a hand in a large sweep to encompass everything. “It all stays the same. I can keep trying to run, but the moment I relax it all comes back.” The sweep returns, points towards the entry hall. “Danarius is going to /come through that door/, because I had the audacity to /think I could be happy/.”

“You live with a mage? What mage?!” Anders’s grin bares his teeth. “Because I’ve been sleeping in my clothes on a cot in Darktown all week! So who are you shacking up with now, Fenris? I suppose Isabela was right about your issues. And to think a few years ago I might have been flattered that I got to play a stand-in for a Tevinter magister! So don’t you whine at me! Don’t you dare! Let me take my books and leave and, behold, your life will be ever that much closer to the way you apparently WANT it! Alone and living in a fucking hole, is that freedom to you? You told me you were alone, you told me you had no connection with anything, and I try to bring you together with someone who can, unequivocally, understand you… and you… you…!” Anders’s throat seizes too tight to let his voice escape. His staff clatters to the floor as he covers his face with both hands. 

Despite being able to tether his own leash to keep himself from outright attacking, the moment the staff drops out of reach he launches forward to cross the space between them, unnervingly quiet until his fist connects and closes on the coat over Anders’ chest, the force unchecked as Fenris slams him against the nearest wall, body glowing as he presses closer. “Did you even /think/ about how I’d feel about my past being shoved into my face? That you and Hawke are using someone as an accessory to making me 'feel better’? She’s not some /holiday pet/ to present me without asking.”

Anders slams against the wall hard enough that it rattles his teeth. “I did. I assumed you would hate it. And you would hate me for it. And then…. it would do you, and her, a world of good.” Anders’s ears are ringing. He can taste a tang of blood in his mouth from where his teeth cut into his tongue, and the pain settles on him like a daze. Why does it even feel good when Fenris hurts him? Why is pain from Fenris’s hand better than half a dozen nights of nothing? Is he really so pathetic? If Fenris has used him as 'mage’ is Fenris his templar, there to punish him for all his wrongs? “Now if you would kindly…” He ends up chuckling bitterly. “either kill me or let me take my damned books, we’re done here. You’ll never need to suffer my misguided good will again. I’m done with you.”

Fenris’ strength falters a split second, only noticeable from this close. “I put my trust in another mage, and he does something he knows I’ll hate and ends it when I’m as angry as he expected. I’m a fool.”

“You’re angrier by far than I expected you to be. I just -also- expected your feelings for me, if there were any, to mean something too. But I’m nothing to you but ‘a mage,’ am I? You lying piece of shit. You might as well rip the heart out of my chest, I already know how it feels!”

“What do you think is keeping me from doing /just that/? I keep /trying/ to trust you, a part of you still scares me as much as the day I met you, and you keep asking for /more from me/! Why couldn’t you just leave us be.”

“Everything I ask from you I’ve asked for your sake. I’m a healer. I can’t leave you sitting in the dark picking at your wounds, that wouldn’t be love. And even so… part of me… would undo everything I’ve done to make you reject me. I would make myself your slave, do nothing but by your leave, live for nothing but for your approval. I… could do that. I have more need of you than I have pride.”

The trailing veins of lyrium fade, a shimmer at first and then slow enough to seem like one had just been staring too long and gotten accustomed to the visible rage. “What makes you think, after everything, that I would want a slave?”

“I feel as if I don’t know what you want. If I ever did.” Anders hangs his head. “I can only wait for you to tell me and hope that I can be that. You… wanted me to go and I left. You wanted me to come here and I came. I just… need the pain to stop. I don’t even know if I’m right or wrong anymore.”

“…caudex. No matter how many times you hurt me the only thing I /want/ is to be at your side.”

“Then why did you not come for me?” There’s a quaver in Anders’s voice. “Did I hurt you… so much?”

“My past was already too close with Hadriana, I may have a sister, and you presented me with a slave. I… needed time to think.”

Anders nods mutely, still leaning against the wall where Fenris had pinned him. Part of him wants to go on at length about exactly how much it had hurt, waiting for a reconciliation that never came. But it would be insufferably selfish, when it’s already been demonstrated how poorly he really understands Fenris’s needs. 

Fenris’ hand finally releases it’s grip, the metal tipped fingers spreading and smoothing down the strained fabric. he just replaces the steady weight with himself as he leans in, tipping his head just so to press his parted lips against Anders’ in the most unobtrusive way he can.

Right or wrong, Anders finally breaks down. His eyes close and start to stream with tears. He manages a ragged gasp before he begins to sob into that kiss. He had convinced himself so thoroughly that they were done. He’s spent every day since he’d left the mansion waiting for Fenris to come, expecting him to come, and feeling rejected all over again when he never did. He does what he can to kiss back, with quivering lips and a howl of pain in his throat he’s fighting hard to swallow.

Fenris lifts an arm to wrap over Anders’ shoulders, that firm gentleness returning to his movements. The hand on the mage’s chest slips upward, the metal careful as it spreads over his cheek, and a thumb wipes a tear back. “Don’t. I’m sorry.”

“Don’t -ever- do this to me again,” Anders rasps. The mage is hardly pretty when he cries. Under the redness around his eyes, there are obvious heavy shadows. He fights to rein in his tears while he leans his cheek against that gauntlet. He lets the strap of his knapsack slip off his shoulder, the bag dropping to the floor.

Fenris brushes his hand back through Anders’ hair, fingertips lightly curling along the back edge, that faint dip where the neck ends, hiding just below the mess of tied-back hair. He drops his head, finds the small crook of Anders’ neck to lean his forehead against it. "I know. I tried to tell you.“

Anders rests his chin on the crown of Fenris’s head. He wraps his arms around Fenris, gently at first, but the embrace becomes desperately tight for a heartbeat or two. "Just don’t do it again,” he pleads. "Sine te non totum.“ Anders kises Fenris’s hair. "Ubi es, optima me tecum vadat.”

Fenris moves his head in a small unintended nuzzle, lifting his chin until the bridge of his nose is propped against the rise at the base of Anders’ neck, his other cheek and ear burrowed against the collar of the man’s coat. “You’re getting better at that.”

“Had a week to rehearse it,” Anders mutters dryly. He turns his head, stubbly chin rubbing against Fenris’s scalp. His chest rises and falls in a deep, shaky sigh. "I’d like to take you to bed now, if you’ll have me.“

Fenris’ arms fall away as he steps back, the touch against Anders’ neck leaving the air cool in his wake. He nods once, half turning towards the stairs but stopping before he even gets that far, and glances up from the corner of one eye to add, "Orana will be glad you’re back.” In case Anders had wondered if she’d been kicked to the curb yet.

“I’ve heard she’s doing well. Thank you.” Anders has asked for word of her from Varric and Isabela, the bare couple of times he’s made himself available for anyone to talk to. He follows close to Fenris, only pausing to pick up his staff from the floor and lean it against a wall. "If you don’t want her to stay with us….“ Anders trails off with a sigh. ”..then we should talk to her about it. There are options. I’m sorry. I’m sorry for throwing this on you. There were better ways… I was foolish.“

Fenris had kept going to start up the stairs when Anders starts apologizing. He pauses again to look back, giving him a convenient excuse to wait for Anders to catch up anyway. "Stop. She’s staying. It’s decided.” Well that must be that, then.

“As you wish,” Anders replies. He’s happy to drop the subject, and he moves a bit quicker to catch up with Fenris on the stairs. There’s still a slump to his posture that’s easily read as a combination of crestfallen and weary.

Fenris silently watches the mage until he catches up again, and turns to continue the rest of the way when they’re closer again. “I thought you’d be pleased.”

“I am.” Anders raises his head, managing a gentle hint of a smile. "I’m sorry… I… The only thing I can think of right now is you.“

The response just makes Fenris feel worse, though he doesn’t readily show it. At the doorway to the bedroom Fenris reaches back to catch the front of Anders’ clothes almost lazily, and pulls him closer. That poor jacket gets so tortured, between the wolf and the cat. When the mage is close enough he pulls at an edge to find the end of the chain keeping it closed, muttering idly to himself. “I hate this coat.”

Anders is in the middle of reaching for the clasp when it simply snaps off. The chest and collar of his coat are definitely showing signs of abuse, including punctures from Fenris’s gauntlets. Anders only drops his forehead to Fenris’s shoulder and sighs. The buckles of his coat come undone, one by one, and he shrugs out of it, letting it fall to the floor. there hardly seems any point to hanging it up, now.

Fenris blinks as the clothes practically fall off in pieces and Anders slumps against him. With a small sigh of his own, suddenly regretting his comment, he drops his hands to Anders’ waist. "Orana can fix it.” She might protest at bothering fixing such a grungy old thing, but he has no doubt she knows how to.

“It’s hardly worth the effort. Don’t worry, I can still wear it like this. Maybe I should just burn the thing…” Anders thinks about confessing that the coat was sewn together from pieces of his old Tevinter-style robes, but he feels too fragile by far to tease Fenris right now. He backs out of Fenris’s loose embrace and sits down heavily on the bed. "I could ask Lirene to knit me a sweater.“

Fenris lets Anders go at that, the man’s hips slipping out of his hands.He takes the moment to unbuckle his armor, the straps to the chest loosening around him then giving up as he passes the pieces to the nearest table. The elf peoccupies himself truly enough, but hides behind it as the gauntlets are pulled off. "No, it smells like you.” He’s not ready for such a confession, and distracts himself by focusing intently on undoing the clasps at his arms.

Anders raises his head, and then his eyebrows, smiling a bit more fully. He tugs his boots off and kicks them away. “I imagine anything would if I wore it for a few weeks, but I admit I like the feathers. They have flare.” He props one heel on the edge of the bed and leans against his raised knee, watching Fenris and beginning, to his surprise, to feel better.

Fenris grows too impatient, and once everything protective is extracted off his body he returns to sit at Anders’ side at the edge of the bed, then falls to his back to stare up at the decaying stone ceiling. “I have a sinking feeling that those were black, once.” A far cry from the sun faded grey-white shoulders they look like now. 

“Um… sort of. Black. Off-black. Maybe… more of a sable.” Anders flops back beside Fenris “What have you been doing, while I was away? Did you find out anything more about your sister?”

Fenris’ shoulders tense unexpectedly at her mention, but relaxes easily enough, and smirks at the ceiling. “The same as before. What do you think I did before I let you live here?”

“You said you danced. Still hoping to catch you at it.” Anders smiles at the ceiling. “But since you’ve been… thinking, I thought I would ask if you would share any of your thoughts with me.”

“Mm.” Fenris just makes the small sound instead of ‘oh, /that/ thinking’. And because he needs to be silent a moment while collecting what he can into something that might pass as coherent. He raises a hand so he can lightly drape is over his eyes as he closes them. “The things I said. Why I’m so threatened, or like it’s all the same dream I’ll be pushed from. What to do about Orana. Why I act this way, when I don’t want to.“

The bed shifts as Anders rolls to his side, and he drapes his arm across Fenris’s chest. "Did you find any answers?” he asks softly. 

Fenris blindly slips his arm under the mage’s waist, hooks along the small of his back to pull them closer, and sighs heavily. “….you remind me of him, here. Or with Hawke, when you’re just..” He trails off. What. Just being a mage? That’s not quite it. “But pushing you away just hurts so much more.”

“Why?” Anders presses his face in against Fenris’s shoulder. “I’m assuming you mean… Danarius.” It takes effort, deliberation, to get himself to say that name, and when he does it’s tinged a bit darker, the way it always is when Fenris says it.

It’s easier to talk somehow, with his sight covered. Reminds him a bit of horses with blinders, undistracted. His hand arches at his old master’s name, thumb and forefinger rubbing his eyelids. “It’s familiar. I can’t see myself owning this, so you must.” It’s terrible, how a mind fills in the blanks, and he sighs again pointedly in an attempt to shake Danarius out of his mind. “But I was always wary of you after watching how you reacted over Karl, regardless.”

“Because of Justice,” Anders completes. “I’ve wanted to ask you why you seem to fear demons above other things. As far as I’m aware, most of the cruelty that’s been inflicted on you was done by men.” Anders gazes across Fenris’s body, watching the flicker of embers in the hearth, and he sighs. “You fear me. It never occured to me that you would fear me. I always saw… a will of iron, and an indomitable rage in you. I’ve feared you, you know. I’m not so foolish I can’t tell how dangerous you are.” 

Fenris stifles an outright laugh. “You’re the only one that’s called me those things.” That means he can dismiss it as love blindness. “They make mages all the more powerful and the evil all the more wicked. Why wouldn’t I despise everything that caters to the magisters even moreso than their slaves? They blacken everything they touch.” Those last words aren’t violent, per se, but… pointed.

Anders does his best not to recoil a bit at those words. He lifts himself up on one elbow so he can look down at Fenris and watch his lips, at least. “Why do I remind you of him?” He pauses and in a smaller voice he adds “I… don’t want you to fear me. I don’t want to be like these mages you hate.”

 

Fenris’ eyes open at the movement, though still shielded by his hand, and he glances back down soon enough, eyes darting along his palm for an answer. His words to respond go quiet, a bit faltering. "Just two people I cared about.“

"You… loved …” Anders can’t help but sound shocked. His expression shifts as this filters through his mind; perplexity, then horror, then sympathy. “…I… thank you for telling me. I think I understand you a little better now.” Anders settles again, this time with his head on Fenris’s chest, his ear almost directly over his heart.

Fenris practically hisses as he raises his hand from his eyes. “I didn’t /say/ that.” Well… not technically, but might as well have. His hand drops again, heel of his palm against his forehead. “I suppose it is. But it means different things as a slave. You don’t understand.”

“I don’t understand devotion to someone who doesn’t see you as an equal? Someone who values you only for what you can do for them? Being dragged along because you need someone to approve of you so badly it’s like having a hook in your heart? Am I even close?” Anders softens his voice. “Help me understand. I’ll listen.”

Maker, why is he actually about to talk about this. “It doesn’t hurt like you think it would. Everything you could think up for me to be angry about didn’t occur to me until the Fog Warriors told me that I should feel angry, after they’d broken me. Until then it was just.. what he wanted.”

Anders listens to the soft sonorant thrum of Fenris’s voice as it comes to him through his chest, against the rhythm of a steady heartbeat. “And… when you went back with him… I suppose everything seemed different to you then.”

Fenris shakes his head. “Not everything, just me. He never changed. I killed them so easily, and my leg was healed as if they’d never existed. Nobody even bothered to tie me down on the ship home.”

“Your leg? What did they do to your leg?”

Fenris glances down. He completely hadn’t noticed that he even mentioned that, too focused on how he’d felt at the time. This explanation comes easily, not nearly as hesitant as the rest. “I was a Tevinter slave stronger than they’d ever seen, cornered by Qunari. As a last resort they drove and weighted a spike through my leg, so I would stay while they slept.”

Anders shudders and rises up on his elbow again, aghast that Fenris could relate that so calmly. “They did what?! And you… how could you sleep? How could you even keep a wound like that from growing infected and killing you? There had to be something less cruel!” Suddenly, he doesn’t feel as bad about Fenris killing them all.

“We managed. It was short lived, but they still cared about it as they could and were free with sharing the alcohol.” Fenris has an edge of a glare, clearly still feeling in their debt despite this.

Anders finds himself looking down the length of Fenris’s body in spite of himself, as if any trace of that old injury would be left for him to see. "All that, and they still did well by you,“ he murmurs.

It would be an insult to Tevinter’s spotless healing if there’d even been the slightest mark left. There’s nothing, though thinking back he might’ve limped on that leg slightly more often than the other. Could be coincidence though. "They had nothing else to use against me. Once I started listening, they removed it.”

“What did they tell you? What made you start to change your mind?” It takes Anders some effort to relax again, but slowly, he manages to sink back into place against Fenris’s side.

“Just watching them. Everyone with tasks I thought only slaves should do… their leader cooking, and nobody thinking it was menial. Thinking back on it, it was no mistake that she put me exactly where I could see them all. There are many ex slaves with them, and the Qunari, in high ranks. I’m sure they find re-education to the Qun routine. I hardly noticed until Danarius returned.”

“It still sounds…pleasant. Peaceful. Certainly a better place than Kirkwall. I’d give so much, for peace and freedom like that.”

“It wasn’t so perfect. They were fighting a doomed war, and routinely tortured mages. I just didn’t mind at the time.”

“They…” Anders swallows, tasting bile in his throat. "Do you still think we’re all either corrupt or inevitably on our way to being so?“

"Only most of you. Bethany seems to be one of the rare few.”

Anders sighs heavily, reminded of an exchange they’d had long ago. "I guess that’s a start.“ He lets it go, though he hardly seems content in doing so.

Fenris drops the hand drawn over his face to the mattress, and shoves his arm back to half prop himself with an elbow. "Tell me what I’ve experienced otherwise.” It’s not accusatory, more a genuine question than the elf even intends. His small embrace around Anders’ waist tightens, voice dropping to a quieter and more overtly concerned tone. "I’ve seen how you suffer.“

"Very little, which is the problem. Here in Kirkwall, you’ve experienced the people who have been pushed beyond what they could endure, and they are damaged or broken, with every hope shattered and every refuge taken from them. You’ve seen the desperation of people who have nothing to lose and little to gain. And then… there’s Bethany to be our counterexample. A woman who grew up with a family who loves her. Most of us are pariahs. I’m not the only person I knew in the Circle who was turned over by a parent who was terrified of all that they were. But she has always known that she has worth. And there are more like her, who submit, who suffer in silence, and you will never know them because they’re prisoners.” Anders speaks softly, looking Fenris in the eyes. "Everyone suffers,“ he adds with a soft smile. "I’m lucky to have you. Not everyone has someone who cares.”

Fenris pulls his arm higher, the tips of his fingers drawing up along Anders’ spine. “I don’t mean to say it isn’t unfair. But is it fair to hold others responsible if life wasn’t as nurtured as hers?” He sighs softly and goes quiet, too emotionally tender for their usual stock squabbling. “I also don’t mean to sound like I have an answer. The circle seems like a viable option but the one here no more protects mages than the Qunari would.”

Anders gives a soft moan at that stroke along his back, and his body curls warm and snug against fenris. He nuzzles in close again, the catch in his breathing sounding like pure gratitude. "It’s a topic for another time,“ he murmurs. Fenris seems vulnerable, as vulnerable as he feels himself, and it makes Anders want to do nothing more than shower him with tenderness and reassurances. "How do you feel, right now?”

“lost.” The word stumbles out of Fenris’ mouth before he puts any thought to it. His touch flattens out over Anders’ shoulders and he pulls the mage higher as he drops back off his elbow. The two movements practically collide them into a kiss but in a carefully gentle way, silent gratitude that he’s not alone right now.

Anders closes his lips against Fenris’s. For a moment he lets one hand rest on the small of the elf’s back, just to tighten the embrace they’re in, to show he wants him close. He shares more kisses, his lips touching the corners of Fenris’s mouth one at a time, his eyelids, his chin, the bridge of his nose, each a warm and tender touch.

The muscles in Fenris’ back ripple to life under the mage’s touch but it’s otherwise unprotested. He lets his eyes drift closed, the nail edge of a finger absently drawing invisible patterns along the backside of Anders’ shoulder. “It never occurred to me how much I need you. I can’t do this alone. ”

“You shouldn’t have to,” Anders murmurs. “I want to help you. I always have.”

Fenris shifts in Anders’ grasp, freeing both of his hands and raising them up to press his palms to the curve in the man’s jaw. “You deserve more than my mess.”

“But I want you. Mess included. More than anything else.” Anders arms cross somewhere behind Fenris’s shoulders. "Even with everything wrong with us, you make me happier than I’ve ever been.“

Fenris goes silent at that, head tipping down as he glances away, inadvertently propping his forehead against the mage’s but on the other hand makes no motion to pull away. "I don’t think I have.” Considering their last fight was rather.. rough, to day the least. “I warned you that I’d hurt you, knew it would happen, and I did it anyway. And I nearly tore us apart again because I’m still as much a coward as I’ll ever be.”

“Do you know I’ve never seen you as a coward?” This close, Anders feels like he could drown in Fenris’s eyes. "If you’re not proud of what you’ve done… don’t do it again. Mend the harm done and try to do better. It’s all anyone can do. Can you try to do that? I love you… I love you even more than I did that first night. I want to be with you. You just have to try… and I’ll be with you, trying just as hard.“

Fenris shoves his chin up and against Anders’ mouth roughly in response, sudden and as passionate as if they’d been going at making out for a while. The pressure is almost painfully short and the elf pulls away as fast as he’d launched into it, his lips trailing down the man’s jaw to lay kisses down his throat and the curve of his adam’s apple. Somewhere in the small flurry he manages to choke out a small, "I’m sorry.”

Anders gasps at that kiss, arching up beneath Fenris and tipping back his head. His throat is smooth and warm, pulse steady under Fenris’s kisses, his breath hitching in tender surprise. His arms wrap around Fenris in a tight hug, rocking them both gently back and forth. "I forgive you" Anders can feel the tickle of the elf’s breath in the hollow of his throat. 

Fenris’ entire back tightens harder but it just seems to make him a little more desperate. His lips part, breath hot as he runs his tongue up from the crook at Anders’ collarbone, and closes to a kiss at the center of his neck. His hands very lightly draw up from the man’s cheeks to brush into his hair, find that small tie in the back and loosen it. He finds himself overwhelmed with the need to show he’s grateful he is, but has no words for it. Anything he does now just feels like weak graspings at what he wants to convey.

Anders smooths his hands along Fenris’s tense back, indulging in this one slow touch before he bends back his wrists, lifting his hands away. He tips his chin to get a glimps of Fenris’s face under the fringe of silver hair that hides his eyes. There may be no words for what he reads there, but he understands at least some of it, and that understanding sinks in deep. He shivers at the feeling of the leather tie sliding out of his hair.

Instead of escalating the spontaneous fire slowly cools, the elf’s back mirroring as it relaxes for entirely different reasons. Fenris’s kisses die down but don’t stop altogether; his kisses just shift over to one side of Anders’ neck, and he starts to tentatively suck at the softer skin there. It feels strange, and in a small part a betrayal to himself, but there’s a dedicated thrill toward the idea of leaving a mark on the man, that Anders is his in a way you can’t just buy.

Anders turns his head, making an offering of the side of his neck that Fenris starts to suck on. His breathing quickens just a touch, arousal sending a slow flush through his skin, but tonight it’s a slow burn rather than a sudden desperate surge as in the past. It suits Anders fine. They’re together tonight, and that sates a much deeper need than just some bodily craving… though that need is hardly disconnected from his flesh. There were moments when the ache he felt in his soul echoed through his bones. The weight of Fenris’s body comforts all those hurts.

It’s a bit of time before Fenris lets up, and when he does he adds a few smaller pecks around the redder, freshly forming spot. His movement comes to a stop as he unintentionally nuzzles against Anders’ cheek, just finding a comfortable spot before he settles completely with a drawn sigh. “If Isabela hounds you later, I’m sorry.”

“I don’t mind. I think I can wear this proudly.” Anders helps Fenris cuddle in the crook of his arm, turning his head to pepper his forehead with kisses. "I’ve been wanting something like that… to wear like you’ve been wearing my feathers.“

Fenris puffs a bit of a silent, subdued chuckle as he lets his eyes close and just.. basks. In the warmth and touch that his body completely welcomes, the subtle scent of the man on every breath and the traces of stubble pleasantly brushing against him. "That’s not quite the same.”

“Not quite. I like it, though.” A glance down at Fenris and Anders can see the contentment in his face. To know that he could give him that makes him feel warm all over again. "I hope you know I’m never going to get tired of holding you like this.“

"Good.” There’s the very slightest grumble to that answer, half assed threat should Anders be thinking otherwise in the slightest, or about moving anytime soon. “I was intending to stay until we fell asleep.” Regardless that it’s the middle of the afternoon.

“I like this plan, and I am excited to be a part of it,” Anders murmurs and shuts his eyes.


	23. Chapter 23

The sun has started to set by the time Fenris moves. Even then it only starts as a small shift in place, a small unconscious nuzzle against warm skin before the elf wakes up. He sighs heavily if only for an excuse to breathe in more of the mage, but after a moment he groggily pushes an arm under himself to slowly sit up. As nice as this is, his stomach is starting to bother him with pesky hunger. It’s funny, how much food suddenly matters again.

Anders is much more reluctant to stir from his slumber. Fenris’s shifting is answered with a sleepy wordless mutter, and then a stretch and a loud groan. Anders is wearing a cat on his head again, but Ser Mewins keeps his claws to himself, instead giving Anders’s forehead kisses with his raspy feline tongue. He needed the sleep. He still felt the warmth on his body where Fenris had been, and it’s comforting. "I think I smell food.“ Anders tries not to sound eager, but he fails, likely giving away a hint to how little he’s eaten in the past few days. What surprises him, though, as much as the smells of bread and stewing meat and herbs, is the sound of a woman’s voice, humming and wordlessly singing.

 

In the mansion’s kitchen, there’s the quiet chiming clatter of dishes being set out on the table, an accompaniment to Orana’s humming. Anders is back. She hadn’t been quite sure how to feel about the presence of a Mage in the household when she had seen his things sitting in the main atrium. But then she had snuck a glimpse into Fenris’s room and found them sleeping, and it made everything seem quite alright. After all, Merrill was a mage and Orana already felt a sort of exasperated adoration for the dalish woman. Mages here were clearly a whole different thing from Magisters in Tevinter. 

 

The oxtail soup still needs a bit longer in the pot, and the warm, dark bread needs to rest before she cuts it, but the wine is poured, the candelabra set at the center of the rough kitchen table, candles lit. Just a few small but obvious gestures towards celebrating the two having kissed and made up.. if she’d had any notice, Orana thinks to herself with a quiet ‘tsk’, she would’ve found some oysters at the dockside market.

Fenris stretches in place, half wondering why Anders isn’t following suit if he’s so hungry, until he looks over. Oh. He leans forward to prod at the cat’s side in his best attempt to shoo it away. "You’re hallucinating, the only woman to dare set foot in here is Isabela.” His hand darts back as the cat turns to nip in his direction. Fine then. He lazily abandons Anders to fend for himself as he crawls off the bed he always thought was much too large, and stands as he smells the air uncluttered by the mage’s distracting scent. “You coming?”

Anders reaches back and distracts the kitten with a friendly headscratch, enabling him to slip a hand under that soft belly and lift Ser Mewins off his head. After being dropped lightly on the floor, the little cat saunters over to Fenris and begins doing figure eights around his legs. Anders pulls his tunic on before he joins Fenris by the door. "I am.“ His voice breaks, to his surprise, and he coughs to clear his throat. What is he suddenly feeling so strongly? Why?

Fenris just attributes it to lingering emotions over their recent fight. He ignores the cat completely beyond shooting it a small annoyed glance, altogether too focused on Anders. It’s small, perhaps too subtle a gesture, as he pauses to watch the man before leading them out the door down the stairs. Beyond that and he doesn’t seem interested in mentioning it, at least not now when they’re turning the corner into the kitchen.  
It’s then that Fenris stops, staring at the layout on the table thusfar. "Orana..” Clearly she knows they’re back together, and the overt romance dinner makes him feel so awkwardly embarrassed.

Fenris isn’t the only one suddenly shy at seeing a candle-lit dinner in the midst of being served. Anders flushes bright pink and pushes a hand through his hair, imagining it must look like a straw birdsnest by now. Orana, however, looks quite pleased with herself. "You didn’t tell me Anders was coming over,“ she says. It’s surprising how that cheerful singsong lilt conceals something a bit threatening, like a woolly sock with a brass doorknob in it. "He’s staying this time, I hope?” She smacks her wooden spoon against an open palm as she gazes steadily at Fenris.  
It’s enough to make Anders’s jaw drop. And then, something clicks, and he wets his lips, looking past Orana to the pot over the fire. "Is that… oxtail soup? It smells just like ma– just like my mother used to make.“

Fenris’ gaze doesn’t break from hers but he doesn’t look particularly comfortable either, looking a bit like a cat caught stealing milk from the pantry. "I…” His cheeks go hot at what he wants to say, and he finally turns his gaze away to just go find a seat of the two obvious options in defeat. “It’s up to him.”

Anders quickly steps up behind Fenris and slips his arms around his waist. "How kind of you, love.“ There’s a bit of a tease in his tone, but he kisses the back of Fenris’s neck before he lets him go, and sits down opposite his lover with a grin on his face. "Miss Orana, you treat us both better than we deserve”  
“I know,” Orana chirps before busying herself about the fireplace again. "Do you like oxtail soup? I hoped you would, I had some beef stock left over from the other day and normally I’d let this cook a lot longer but it’s really quite good like this too…“

Fenris all but stumbles the rest of the way to his seat. The table, the glass of wine he’s already reaching for to hide himself in, someone so frustratingly loving opposite him and someone cooking for nobody else. It’s all too much. He manages to choke out a meek "It’s fine.” before he attempts to down the glass in one shot. It’s a bit like trying to drown in a puddle.

“You’re not eating with us?”  
Orana turns her head while she’s in the middle of licking a bit of soup off the back of her spoon. "Oh, I will, but very quickly.“ Her whole face brightens as she answers, Anders’s question as good as a friendly invitation. "I went out on a walk with Merrill today and I think I saw the whole city twice. I’m going to take over the bath for a few hours and leave you be.” The soup, she decides, is fine, and she takes the pot off the fire. She serves the pair of them in rather fashionable wide, shallow bowls, and places the bread on a board between them, with a scoop of fresh, cool butter. "Fenris was so gloomy while you were gone. I’m happy you’re back now. He’s been kind, and it would be nice to see him smile.“

"Likely sooner than later.” Fenris dips his head a bit closer to his glass, before he knocks the last of it back with determination that he’s not going to get anywhere in this damn mansion if he can’t handle this idle banter. Somehow it feels like something he should actually work on, more personal than what happens while out with Hawke where they’ll all go their separate ways at the end of the day. He straightens, casts a sidelong glance towards Orana. “You shouldn’t encourage him.”

“Why not? It’s true, you were very gloomy.” Orana refills Fenris’s glass without being asked, turning the bottle and bringing a cloth to its mouth in the proper, tevinter manner. Not a drop spilled. "Feel free to finish the pot if you like. I’m going to have a niiiiiiiiiiice hooooooooot baaaaaaaaaath…“ Orana sighs even imagining the languid delight that awaits as she saunters out of the room, letting her hair down. 

Fenris watches the the wine fill into the glass silently, and the bottle specifically not going into his hand. Drinking from a glass like this is just awkward, and he would much rather have the rest instead of repouring so often. As she leaves he finally deems it safe to try the oxtail soup. He glances up in the middle of his testing sip from his spoon. "This is.. nice.”

Anders already has the spoon to his lip, eyes shut. He breathes in deeply, and exhales slowly in a sigh. "Better than ma’s,“ he whispers. "Orana’s a gem. I’m glad she’s staying with us, and not just because of the cooking either. It’s nice having a lady in the house. Those delicate footsteps, and the singing… makes it start to feel like home.” Anders smiles.

His small statement had been all Fenris intended, and he keeps eating until Anders’ last words. “Home?” From what he knows of Anders, there wasn’t much home between running away and getting dragged back by Templars. “You mean.. before the circle?”

Anders answers with a small nod, wondering for a moment if he can handle talking about it. But his words a moment ago run through his head and his expression turns guilty with a new understanding. "My parents were sharecroppers living near the northern edge of the Bannorn, not too far from Highever. The Templars took me when I was twelve. I’d been hiding my magic for several years at that point… and then I had an accident. The barn burned down. We lost pa’s prized dairy cow in the fire. He sent for the Templars himself.“ Anders relates it all conversationally, even managing to smile a bit before he sips at another spoonful of soup. "Mama would make this soup every year on her and papa’s anniversary. Her own ma had served it at their wedding, exactly nine months and one day before I was born…” Anders winks here “..off in the Anderfels. I was two years old when Papa brought us to Ferelden for a fresh start.”

Fresh start, alright. “You said your father summoned the Templars.. did he know what would happen? And your mother..?” Fenris doesn’t pretend to understand the poor from outside of Tevinter, but this country is just so.. odd. Maybe it was a small boon to send him away, though painful. He pauses a moment, then adds, “Did you try looking for them when you escaped? Your mother, at least.”

“He knew.” Anders takes a sip from his wineglass. "He could barely stand having me in the house, once he’d sent word to the Highever Chantry. Barely spoke to me. At first I thought he was angry. He wasn’t… he was scared. When the Templars came it took him and one of the knights to hold my mother back. I heard her screaming my name even after the farm was out of sight.“ Anders rests his hands on the table, gazing into the candlelight for a moment. "I did try to go home. My first escape, I didn’t get very far. My second… I told you how it ended. And after that I thought, why go home, when I knew my father would hand me over again, and I was …older… looking for other things when I had the freedom to pursue them. Then, the last time… it was in the early days of the Blight. I had to know if they were alive, if they were safe…”   
Anders smiles and shakes his head, chuckling to himself. "By the time I was on the road I had it all scripted out in my head like a bloody puppet show. I’d be there just in time to save mother and father from the darkspawn. Father would embrace me, manly tears standing in his eyes as he told me he knew now that my magic was a gift from the Maker, and he was proud to call me his son. And Mother would hold me and cry and call me by name, and she’d say how much I’d grown, and fret that I wasn’t eating well enough…“   
"But when I reached the farm… there was nothing left but a scorched ruin. I found no bodies, burnt or otherwise, but that doesn’t mean much. When I was finally able to come to Kirkwall, I thought… maybe they made it here. Maybe if I spent time among the refugees I would find them.” He shakes his head, biting down on the inner surface of his lip. "I hope the Darkspawn did not take her. I’ve seen what becomes of the women they take. I hope… the end was quick, or that maybe she died quietly before the Blight even began. And I hope the Templars know, my Father knows, they broke that woman’s heart, and the only thing she did wrong was give me life.“

Fenris is silent a moment after Anders finishes, glances down to his wine glass and the deep blood reds capturing the reflection of the candles as he thinks on this. "It wasn’t wrong.” He smirks, weakly. “You’re an abomination trying to save everyone. It might be foolish, but it’s not wrong.” He glances up, careful with his next words. “Are you sure you’ve been running from the Circle more than your father?”

Anders takes a moment to consider that, something troubled and meek showing in his face at last. "Maybe. Maybe just… running from his rejection. Trying to get away from that feeling that I’m just wrong, that there’s nothing I can even do to be right. My father always said to me that family was the most important thing. That even though we were poor in coin we were rich in love. And…“ Anders shakes his head, rubbing his forehead to hide his eyes. ”…I destroyed it. I broke my home. Even if I put the blame on the Templars, the guilt still lives here.“ Anders touches his heart. "I want… a family, again.”

Fenris raises a loose fist, lets the edge of his knuckles rest against his lips. “I don’t really know what to say, but…” He goes a little quieter but doesn’t look away, instead watching Anders’ reactions instead of emotionally retreating like he always does. “..-what you’ve done doesn’t deserve this. Do what you want with the mansion.”

Anders gazes across the table at Fenris, sober but tender. "…Thank you. I didn’t realize, until now, what I was trying to do. I… Maker, I hope it works out, somehow. But I’ve been… feeling it, how a life can be so full. Even mine, even after I’d written it off as a loss. Thank you. You are the last person I expected to hear those words from… and I can’t even put into words the immensity of what you’ve given me… what you’ve offered…“

Fenris can’t take the direct gaze for much longer and glances down, though his voice goes stern. "Don’t thank me, I haven’t given you anything but an ex slave and a rotting corpse of a building. Any ‘family’ here is of your own making.”

“The cornerstone is you,” Anders says softly. "Remember that.“

Fenris shakes his head a bit and goes back to eating the rest of his soup. "Not a very good one. Couldn’t you have chosen someone else?” It’s a bit more of the usual quip, but true. He feels far from dependable. Even the idea that he’s some linchpin makes him antsy.

“If I really wanted to engage my better judgment I wouldn’t be trying at all.” Anders foregoes his soup spoon, just lifting the bowl to his lips and sipping. "And you’re worried, I can tell. Don’t be. Maybe what I mean to say is… you make it feel worth trying. I don’t mean to lay this all on you. So please don’t be burdened.“

Any anxiety is shaken off pretty well as soon as there’s any concern thrown in the elf’s direction. "You’re a very strange, handsome, /hurt/ man, Anders. And you annoy me to no end.” Fenris takes a sip of his wine, for once not gulping it down. “But if I felt burdened, I’d leave.”

“Tell me first?” Anders pleads. "If I do something wrong, give me a chance to make it right?“ Anders swallows hard. "Promise?”

Fenris gives a short, slightly exasperated sigh. “Leave it and enjoy what you have, mage.”

Anders manages a slight grin. "I’m being annoying, just as you– wait. Handsome?“ The candlelight highlights the pink on Anders’s cheeks.

"I’m not going to repeat the obvious for you. You can’t tell me you never noticed women watching you at the clinic.” Well someone took very close notice, despite never being there.

“I’ve… honestly never noticed women watching me at the clinic. Or if I did I assumed it was out of concern for the child or husband I was healing at the time. ” Anders sips his wine, a perplexed furrow in his brow. "Women … like me? Which ones?“

"I didn’t know you expected me to keep track.” Fenris eases up a little, leaning back from his freshly finished meal with the remains of his wine. He’s never bothered with wine glasses in Kirkwall but now that he has one in hand, it’s… odd, slowly swirling the liquid idly and unconsciously imitating his old memories of Tevinter. “There was one with black hair and freckles… and younger. She certainly watched you enough to make me wonder.”

“Freckles!” Anders looks incredulous. "A girl with freckles liked me and I didn’t even..“ Anders narrows his eyes. "Wait, do you… -really- … think I’m handsome?” Anders leans over the table a bit, looking past the candles at Fenris’s eyes. "What’s more important, you do realize yours is the only opinion that matters on the subject, right?“

Fenris pauses mid-sip, the wine pooled around his upper lip before he pulls away from the glass and cocks his head a bit to one side with a small glare. "Would I have said it if I didn’t think so?”

“What, with the amount of agony you put me through trying to get you to take a compliment I think I’m entitled to make a production out of this.” Anders begins to grin after he finishes his wine. "But very well. Since you’re never going to repeat it again I’ll treasure those words always. In any case… I’m glad you like what you see, because it’s /all yours/.“

Fenris finishes the rest of his wine with a last gulp. He.. might’ve been coaching himself on the things he’d say in his long empty moments alone, if they got back together, and now they somewhat swirl in his mind. "I could go into more detail, but you’d burn yourself on the candles.” Or Orana would walk in, and he’d promptly die.

“Well… there is this room upstairs with a bed in it…” Anders lowers his face, looking remarkably coy all of a sudden.

Fenris sets down the empty glass, and rises from his seat as he reaches out to the wine bottle itself. “As long as we stay awake, I’ve slept enough.”

Anders stands up, an anticipatory grin on his face. He grabs the candelabra by its base to light their way up the stairs. "I think we’ll manage somehow.“

Fenris waves a hand for Anders to lead the way, pulling the cold rim of the bottle to his lips. “If you dare fall asleep first, I’ll talk to your demon instead. We’ll see how he handles wine.” Because he really can’t imagine Justice drunk.

 

“Maybe I should, he’s got a few things to say to you.” Anders is, honestly, a bit tired. But not so tired that he wouldn’t rather spend some time keeping Fenris entertained. He pauses at the top of the stairs, and nudges the bedroom door open with his foot once Fenris catches up. He sets the candelabra down on the mantle above the fireplace, then pulls his tunic off again. Amazing how much more whole he feels after some time close to his lover, a good meal, and a bit of wine.

Fenris raises an eyebrow at that, stopping at the doorframe to regard Anders with a hint of wariness. But with Orana around now he reaches behind him, letting his hand blindly land on the door then pulls it shut. He looks down to his chest, busies himself with the fastenings down his front. “I’m not in the mood to argue.”

“Neither are we,” Anders answers with tenderness in his voice. While Fenris undresses and hides behind his hair, Anders straightens the covers on the bed and turns them back. After a moment of hesitation, he unfastens his trousers and slips them off, standing naked and still a bit self-conscious in the candlelight. It’s always easier to push aside shyness when they’re already well on their way to making love.

Fenris’s hands slow as his conscious attention trails off on the last clasp, too busy looking up and just… staring, for a shameless moment. His hands drop from his clothes, just lets his top hang loosely as he reaches forward to press his fingers along the gentle curve of bone defining Anders’ hips, his palms falling gently to follow in the wake of that initial firm touch. As the cup of his hands come to a rest over that curve he steps forward to match their bodies together, comfort any embarrassment away with that heat between them even if the elf is still partly clothed. “I might entertain the idea that you’re blind.” It would certainly explain how the mage wouldn’t see himself up until this point.

“It’s as I said. Your opinion is the only one that matters.” Anders leans against Fenris, his lips skimming over the rim of his pointed ear. "You’re the one I love. The one I crave.“ There’s a pulse, a stir, where their groins nestle together. ”..and I love being yours.“

Fenris breathes out slowly against Ander’s neck. His hands dig tighter against the mage’s skin as he pushes them both back closer to the bed. He’d be tempted to just take the man across the furniture beside them, if it weren’t for the fact that there’s lit candles on it. He doesn’t want to in any case, the dim light a horrible tease for every detail.

Anders steps back, then sinks down onto the bed when he can feel it against the backs of his knees. He scoots up a bit, one knee raised, arms held out to Fenris to beckon him close. The candlelight glints against the small hoop of gold he still wears at the end of his cock. He misses the pressure of Fenris’s hands on the bones of his hips the minute they’re gone.

As if he needed encouragement. Fenris follows, sinks down to one knee that settles between Anders’ thighs, sliding his to firmly press against the mage’s growing hardon, and props his forearms on each shoulder as he leans into a small kiss. There’s something forcibly gentler in his movements tonight, the usual heat there but willfully tied back. His eyes flick up past them, towards the bed stand where the oil is, and actually lets out a groan of frustration. Must it be so far away?

With Fenris holding back a bit, Anders becomes bolder. His lips skim over the marks on Fenris’s throat, parted to suck in the faintest tingle of magic from them. He grinds against the bone of Fenris’s hip, arms wrapping tight around his lean back and rolling him to the bed. "The singing,” he whispers breathlessly as he drags slack lips across Fenris’s collarbone. His voice is breathless, with a strange distant resonance beneath. "I can ache for you in silence no longer…“

Fenris barely pauses, his hips leaning forward for anything he can press the slowly thickening bulge in his pants against, and tips his chin up to allow better access to the skin at his neck. His tightly contained lust proves too distracting, makes him miss the subtler meaning behind the words. "We’ve been far from silent, I think..”

Anders reaches between them, cupping Fenris’s groin with his hand, grinding the heel of his palm against that swelling shaft. He brings his other hand to the back of Fenris’s neck, cupping and supporting it, holding him to his lips. His breath on the curving lyrium-line along the side of Fenris’s neck carries with it a surge of pleasure and longing. Yet there’s something deliberate in every motion Anders makes, as if even with his cock rigid against Fenris’s thigh it isn’t lust driving him any longer. Thin fissures of blue form on Anders’s skin, a contrast to the warm orange glow of the candlelight.

Fenris reaches back immediately to catch Anders’ wrist at his neck, forcibly peels it off and holds it away by a few inches. The blatant disregard for where those hands go, the room’s light going cool, and he jerks back a little, enough to get a clearer view of the man under him. As much of the man that’s left right now, anyway. But for now he just looks.. confused, despite his tendency to hate the demon. “You?”

Justice answers with a discrete nod, a minute dip of his chin. A swirling lyrium-blue light covers his eyes like a film of oil on water. "Do not fear me. I would never harm you.“ Even though the familiar resonance is in his voice, Justice speaks softly. He lets Fenris hold his wrist, the Lyrium in Fenris’s skin sending a soothing tingle through his arm. The song is filling his head, and Justice is sharing it with Anders, aware of the feeling of the mage, his soulbonded friend, half intoxicated with the strange bliss of it.

That response really just adds to the confusion. Fenris just.. stares, with not an ounce more clarity than before. He straightens to sit up farther, though not wary enough to outright get up and he’s certainly still half hard under the firm hand holding him, and opens his grip on the mage’s wrist to let it idle there or drop as the other pleases. "Tell me why.” Why for too many reasons to say aloud. Why he’s here now, why he wouldn’t harm the runaway slave, why he’s doing /this/..

Justice lowers his hand, turning it to let his knuckles brush against Fenris’s palm. "We wish an end to this standoff. There is much to be said and done between you and I, Fenris. I do not simply disappear when you are with Anders. I have seen you hurt him and I have seen you heal him. I have felt his joys and his sorrows. We have been at war with ourselves and each other but … we are still of one heart, where you are concerned. We need you. You have reached parts of Anders that even I could not.“

Even while he listens in earnest Fenris’ palm flexes, fingers tight and stretching back, with the faintest shiver in his palm from the tension as the touch becomes less his own. Even with that he can’t take it and retreats a hair farther, hand snapping closed as soon as it’s alone, but after a few lingering seconds his fist lightly drops to rest against the knuckles that caused this reaction in the first place. "Alright…” As much as a part of him may hate the demon, the fact is what’s been done has, and if everything they’ve said is true then there’s no use trying to be with the damn mage and flat out ignore what’s now a part of him unless they’re fighting. Fenris drops his head, with the smallest puff of a smile, punctuated by a smirk at the unexpected sight of his dick cradled by a demon’s hand, only really unnoticed until now because of the pants still covering him. “…but there is no justice here. Only this.”

Justice draws his thumb along the length of that thick shaft, returning Fenris’s hint of a smile. It’s subtle, but the spirit wears Anders’s features just a bit differently, and the smile on his lips isn’t quite the kind of smile Anders would give. "This is well and good, because I came to love you, not to arrest you and judge you.“ He takes his hand away, slowly, in light of how Fenris had reacted to his earlier attempt to touch.

Fenris pauses longer still, transparently hesitant, before he leans forward over Justice. One arm props against the bed, shoulderblade crooked from the weight, hovering their faces close but not quite touching as he tries to regard the blue glow, and just fails at it. Even when he’s going out of his way and it’s Anders’ face, the demon is as hard to read as any other stranger he’s usually only seen when enraged. "I didn’t think you were capable.” Not in the physically appreciative sense, at least.

“That would have been true at one time. I would not even have wanted such a thing.” Justice looks back into Fenris’s eyes, Anders’s pupils wide and dark under the swirling skin of blue light that covers his eyes. He breathes in deeply, and his eyelids lower, as if even Fenris’s scent is direct and tangible pleasure to him. "But I could not have foreseen how different it would be. It is one thing to know the mechanics of the act… another thing entirely to experience it. And I could not have foreseen ever encountering a being such as you… “ Justice raises his eyes to Fenris again. "I have seen little of the world, this I admit. But I have not seen beauty like your form, or poetry like your spirit, anywhere in this world or in the Fade. Anders tells me you will not believe me. But I hope you will at least believe that this is how I feel. The lyrium in you sings to us… but your love makes Anders’s spirit sing within me. It is as close to peace as I have found since crossing the veil. Mayhap it is not a gift you intended for me, but nonetheless…”

Fenris sighs heavily, very tentatively grinds his hips forward now that they’ve been abandoned. There’s a respectful distance and then there’s the beginnings of a silently pleading /need/. “You’re in love with my master’s work.”

Justice lowers his gaze to where Fenris’s body rubs against his. He lifts his hips and rolls them, grinding up against Fenris and moaning at the feeling, surprising himself. “If your master’s work was all I craved would it not have drawn me out before now? You said something to Anders tonight… you do not realize that it is the greatest kindness anyone has ever shown him. This beauty you were inflicted with, albeit against your will.. is married to a good heart. Even without it I would care greatly for you, for your feelings, your fate…”

Fenris’ breath catches on the movement despite his reluctance, and reaches down to pull his clothes out of the way, if nothing else because of the ache pressing against the tight fabric is causing. As Justice trails off he closes the space between them to seal their lips together, cocks pressed together between them as he moves his hand out of the way. The kiss isn’t long, or deep, and he turns his head away. “I was under the impression we had both been doing that for a while. And what’s different now?”

“Anders and I have come to a better understanding.” The kiss leaves Justice breathless, senses reeling. "We each harmed one another without intending to, when we joined. The guilt stood between us like a wall of iron and stone, each of us unable to forgive ourselves for hurting a friend, even when we had forgiven one another. We have grieved for what each of us lost. And we have spoken of how much each of us has gained. Anders accused himself of making me into a demon. But he has touched me with much more than just his suffering. Thanks to you.“

Fenris glances past his loose wisps of hair, down from the mage’s eyes to the cracks of glowing energy along his skin. Getting used to it as he arches his back, hips grinding together in a slowly beginning rhythm before the complete idling drives him mad. "Stop thanking me for things you’ve done.” The both of them. “You’re beginning to put me on a pedestal.” By the sound of it, he’s tired of being there already.

“I want you here,” Justce whispers, a bit of a hoarse rumble in his voice, a strong hint of Anders’s presence. "Now.“ His arms wrap around Fenris’s shoulders and pull him close, his hips rising up, grinding against Fenris, that metal ring dragging and rolling against his hip. The blue light fades away, absorbed back into Anders, but there’s still that hint of a hum of magic around him like an aura.

 

The fading glow catches Fenris’ attention immediately, the lessening otherworldly echo. All the standoffish feelings fall away and he rushes forward to meet Anders’ neck, drawing several fevered kisses up the coarse stubble of the mage’s chin to his lips, and lets his part as soon as they touch. His slow grind at his hips dip lower, force a slow rock forward before his free hand reaches back to draw along Anders’ thigh, and his fingers catch the crook under his knee to pull it up and closer.

Anders lies back, his arms draped over Fenris’s shoulders and crossed at the wrists. He spreads his legs, lifts his knees, and feels the blunt tip of Fenris’s cock nudging at the inside of his thigh. When Fenris’s mouth covers his, he thrusts his tongue past those open lips. He shifts his hips, tilts them, until he can feel Fenris brush against his anus.

Fenris glances up past their kiss, and after visibly lingering he breaks it. With a shift forward his cock presses against Anders’ stomach as he reaches past them, stretched out for a spare second before sinking back into place with the small container of oil they’d left.Just as quickly he presses his lips back to the mage’s, as enthusiastic as if he’d never stopped, mouth still open and inviting. This time a couple fingers press into Anders without much warning, a dollop of thick oil coating them as he spreads and massages the lubrication along the inside.

Anders gasps into the kiss when Fenris’s fingers slide into him. His body flexes and grips at them as they work inside him, igniting a craving for more. Even the brief moment that Fenris breaks their kiss leaves Anders feeling desperate for it to resume, and when Fenris presses his mouth over his again, his lips are wet, his tongue is eager. Fenris’s fingers coax a loud moan from Anders’s throat as they move inside him.

After Fenris finishes the pads of his fingers tease at the hole, pressing firmly and stretching the edge down. Finally it’s enough that he grips the thick base of his cock with his free hand, gently throbbing in the air with the smallest clear pearl beading the tip with need, and holds Anders open as he forces the head past the tight rim. He groans deep into their kiss as his shaft slides past his finger, marveling at the feeling of them both squeezed together before he removes the digit.

Anders gives an impatient moan into Fenris’s kiss as that finger tugs down to open him. If anything could make him feel more desperately empty, it’s that, and the hint of cool air against his slick and fever-hot insides. And then Fenris is in him, breaching him, stretching him, filling him. His arms slip from above Fenris’s shoulders to below, wrapping around him tight as his hips rise to meet that first push.

Once they’re freed up Fenris’ hands, both a bit slippery with oil, leave small trails the air nips at as he drags his fingers up from between Anders’ thighs to the dip at the base of his legs, then finally down to cup back onto those hipbones he’d abandoned. Even with oil his grip is solid when he puts any worthwhile effort into it, and he holds Anders’ hips in place to bear the brunt of it as the elf thrusts deep into him.

Anders tests that grip on his hips, squirming, twisting, trying to buck against Fenris’s unrelenting thrusts. Those hands on him hold firm, and Anders succumbs, able to do nothing but receive. The flush in his cheeks turns vivid and deep, and his ragged panting just fuels moan after moan. His arms loosen around Fenris and go slack, one hand dropping back to the pillow only to be dragged to Anders’s mouth. He bites his knuckles, hard, a futile effort at stifling the sounds he makes. His own erection bobs over his belly, dripping like a tapped keg.

The movements just curl Fenris’ hands, digging against Anders’ skin and cementing him in place, his balls quietly slapping against the mage’s ass as his hips pound forward, his oiled shaft racing in the taught ring of skin. His lips go slack, breath hitching as he drags his lips to just kiss at Anders’ neck, though the term seems a little relative here.

Anders brings one heel to rest against Fenris’s rear, feeling the flex and surge that accompanies every driving push into his body. Fenris’s cock batters at that spot inside of him, coaxing what began as an irresistibly pleasant ache into a tight and urgent craving. His erection brushes against Fenris’s rippling belly, but Anders makes no move to stroke his shaft, He wants Fenris’s hands where they ar, holding him pinned to the bed, holding him braced against each rough thrust. He wants to see how long Fenris can keep this pace, to feel himself climax just from being so diligently fucked.

Eventually he does slow, but mainly as his balls tighten higher, that signature painful tightness building in his stomach that sets his skin on fire, his nerves pulled taught and sensitive. It only serves to give him more room to take his time and Fenris rocks down against hard with each thrust, rough and slow and burying himself to the hilt each time. A small shiver zips down his arms, landing along his fingertips against the mage, then down the elf’s stomach to his hips. "Anders, I’m going to-..”

Anders’s skin feels burning hot, a mist of sweat on his face and chest glittering in the candlelight. He squirms against Fenris’s hips, the slower pace becoming a sweetly agonizing tease that layers pleasure on anticipation on further pleasure. His toes curl into the sheets and he groans, loud and long. The shudder and jerk that starts his climax ripples through his insides. His cock jumps and pulses hard with every spasm, releasing with enough force to splatter his chest and Fenris’s with gorgeous stripes of white.

The other man’s climax clutches at Fenris, and the waves of his orgasm set off the elf’s. For a moment he stops, picking his head up from the mage’s neck as he gasps for air, and snarls as his climax finally but sharply takes hold. With a drawn moan his feet and knees dig against the covers of the bed, pushed forward as far as he can go, his balls smashed against Anders’ ass. His grip finally loosens as his hips are racked with smaller, weaker thrusts forward, the movement doing nothing but coaxing Anders’ orgasm farther.  
Even before it wears away the elf leans in, shuddering at the small spasms between them and smirking softly at it, breathless and barely able to murmur between them. "..amo te.“

Anders hears that whisper, floating on a haze of pleasure and satiation, he kisses at Fenris’s lips, his chin, anything he can reach with languid nuzzles of his lips. He threads his fingers through Fenris’s hair, stealing a brief touch and then letting go, dropping his arms to the bed again. "Beloved,” he sighs, looking up into fathomlessly deep green eyes.


	24. Chapter 24

It’s just past dawn when the sun hits a sharp angle towards the mountainside; the light casts the pale stone city in a morning orange glow, and streaming into the bedroom in visible streams.One hits Fenris square across his back, covers only pulled up to his hips and arms curled around the pillow his face is smothered against. He doesn’t notice the glowing bands heating his shoulders, too usual to acknowledge anymore, but the cat is new and has to climb up onto his back.

Anders is snuggled up rather close to his lover, one arm draped across Fenris’s waist and his cheek resting on the mattress beside Fenris’s shoulder, his slack mouth above a not unfamiliar tiny puddle of drool. the covers are twisted up over him haphazardly, leaving his feet and legs sticking out, but pulled over his head like a cowl.

Fenris slowly becomes aware of something on his back, two small sets of nails digging in and pulling. Groggily his arms slink out from the pillow to shrug under his chest, the shift enough that he can turn his head without disturbing the damn beast. Not that he doesn’t want to, but he has a feeling if he made any sudden movements the cats would latch it’s claws seriously. Instead he tuns his head to Anders, and reaches out to lightly prod him and grumble the best pleasantries he can muster at this hour. “Your cat is.. doing something.”

“Muh?” Anders shifts, stretches, and opens his eyes. He blinks at Ser Mewins, who is purring like a rolling millstone and kneading his tiny pays on Fenris’s back. The sunbeams catch his fluffy fur and make the cat look like he’s outlined in rosy gold. “Oh, he’s making biscuits.” Anders’s sleepy voice positively drips with endearment. “You shweet widdle thing.” Mercifully, Anders scoops up the kitten and rolls onto his back, setting Mewins down on his own chest. The kitten kneads the bundle of covers draped across Anders with even more enthusiasm.

“He’s /what/?” It’s a good thing the cat was extricated from his back, or it was under high danger of being thrown across the room. To make sure it doesn’t come back anytime soon his pushes upa little farther, creating a sloping curve with his bare spine.

“Making biscuits!” Anders apparently finds this -delightful-. “Look!” He lightly scratches the crown of Mewins’s head, the kitten purring all the louder and shutting his large eyes. “There, isn’t that better? So much comfier than that hard sexy body next to me,” Anders coos to the kitten.

Fenris narrows his eyes to a sharp glare towards the lot of it, but it’s hard to even take himself seriously with a face half buried against the pillow and glaring at the damn little beast. “I fail to see how causing you harm is endearing.” But suddenly he’s grateful for the pillow under him, as with Anders’ last word he very obviously buries his face back against the pillow.

“It’s something they do to show they love you. Kittens do it to their mother cats to get more milk to flow.” Anders goes on gently petting the kitten’s head and ears, and gradually the little beast settles, curled up as if nesting on Anders’s chest and purring constantly. “There, he’s going to take a nice nap now.”

Fenris outright chokes at that explanation. His body is most definitely not a giant cat tit to be propped. He drags one of his hands out from under him, and gives Anders a hard shove at his shoulder. “You’re insane.”

“Hey!” Upon realizing that his sleeping spot isn’t going to remain stable, Ser Mewins hops off Anders’s chest and down to the floor. Anders makes a lunge to try and recapture his kitten and discovers the floor is strewn with familiar, bedraggled feathers. Ser Mewins idly bats a few of them around as he scampers over to Anders’s coat, where it was left in a heap on the floor the previous night, and curls up in it. It has more or less been stripped of all its feathers.  
“WHAT DID YOU DO TO MY COAT?! You KILLED it!!! You bloody little Templar!” Anders lurches out of bed, almost tripping in the covers as he shakes them free. The cat takes off, a little cream-tabby blur.

Fenris can’t help but pull himself upright at the sudden ruckus, and not just because the blankets have pulled off of his bare ass. He lazily crawls in Anders’ wake across the bed, perching his elbows and crossing his arms over one edge as he looks out over the damage. It’s terrible, but he can’t help but the tiniest smirk to the edge of his lips. “Useless, and destructive. An amazing animal, to be sure.”

“He was, in fact, fulfilling his function before you punched me in the arm.” Anders sits down heavily on the bed and turns to Fenris, pouting full force. “Why are you so mean to me?”

Fenris just raises a hand to rub the faint burn of sleep from one eye. He’s either completely unaffected by that face or, more likely, is sparing himself from it. “Because I shoved you, or because we fight like dragons in heat.”

“Take your pick.” After a moment of consideration, Anders sprawls across Fenris’s back. He doesn’t want to deal with a bedroom full of feathers and a ruined coat when there’s a warm body and a bed right here.

Fenris folds his arms to perch his chin on top of, pinned more than he has energy to fight off at this hour, and glares lazily at nothing in particular. “You knew who I was when you started this, mage. Don’t act surprised /now/.”

“I’m not surprised, I just want to know why. I’m nice to you, am I not?” Anders shifts and half-curls himself until he can kiss and lick at Fenris’s shoulderblade. “And how do you manage to be so very appealing even when you’re annoyed at me? I always wonder if it has something to do with the eyebrows. You have remarkably sexy eyebrows.”

That comment just makes Fenris’ brows knit. They might have differences in opinion but calling eyebrows sexy just sounds ridiculous. He closes his eyes since he can’t see the man from this angle anyway, and his shoulder flinches at the unexpected touch but doesn’t pull away. Instead it writhes in place a bit, torn between leaning up into it or pulling away from the slightly ticklish feeling of Anders’ tongue at his skin. “I’m not annoyed.” Funny, how he can say that and sound pissed off at the same time.

“Don’t lie,” Anders murmurs. He shifts again, until he lies along the length of Fenris’s body, straddling his thighs, belly resting over the firm swell of his rump. His lips and tongue begin to tease along Fenris;s spine, his hands kept harmlessly to either side of them, on the bed. There’s a muted moan in Anders’s throat, close to the kind of sound he made over dinner the previous night, as he savors the taste he licks up from Fenris’s skin.

Fenris tips his head down until his forehead is resting against his wrists, breath softly faltering. It’s new, having the mage’s weight sinking against him, enveloping him against the mattress, and it’s warmth is somehow comforting. Any sounds of agitation are instantly lost, and replaced with something quieter to match Anders’ tone. “I’m not.”

Anders trails his kisses up Fenris’s spine to the nape of his neck. “Alright, now I’ll believe you,” he murmurs sweetly in Fenris’s ear. His kisses explore each side of Fenris’s neck in turn, pausing for brief moments when Anders nuzzles at his hair, breathes in his scent. His weight is half supported on his elbows, braced to either side of the elf, but the remainder rests on him.

Fenris gulps under the man, muscles along his back and his lungs slowly relaxing fully. This is certainly.. different, in a way overwhelming but not unpleasantly so, and he mutters, “Do you love me or not?” The words are more confrontational than a genuine question.

“I love you so much,” Anders answers in a hoarse whisper. “I love you so much that it crushes the air out of my lungs. I love you so much that it feels too big for my skin to hold in and I ache with it whenever I’m near you. I love you so much that I can see your eyes whenever I close mine, that I whisper your name when I’m alone just to fill the room with thoughts of you…” Anders begins to stir and swell. A lift and a twist of his hips and brings his thickening cock to rest along the cleft of Fenris’s ass. “Every inch of you. Every nuance. Even your barbs I hoard like treasure once I pull them out of my tender parts.”

Fenris sighs heavily, though while he meant it in irritation it just comes out too contently. “I didn’t ask for a litany.” He props himself back up onto his elbows, the motion pressing his back up to Anders’ chest as he turns his head to try to meet the mage’s in any way he can. “Then why are you complaining?”

Anders rolls off of Fenris when the elf starts to shift, though he keeps a leg draped across his hips. “Because I have this horrid, perverse impulse to tease people,” he explains. “As well as, it’s one of my few real talents and I would hate to lose my edge.”

Fenris pauses, and now that he can he glares, irritation rekindled and fueled farther, only tempered by the fact that he just woke up. “You certainly have that down.” He pushes himself to sit up at that, letting Anders’ leg topple off of him, and crosses his legs under himself while he reaches out to what’s quickly becoming the bedside wine bottle. Yes, even at this hour. Just like his halfhearted erection that he’s only making weak attempts to hide.

Anders sits up then, drawing one knee up and actually glaring back. “I could ask you the same. If you love me, why do you complain?” The arousal in him rapidly festers into frustration, and with a quiet snort of aggravation Anders puts his feet on the floor, looking around for his clothes. “As if I’d get an answer. Sod it, I have a clinic to run.”

Fenris gives a short wave of his hand, barely looking in Anders’ direction. “Go on then.” His bottle tips into a heavy pull of wine, the only thing pausing his words. “You don’t even know what you want today.”

“I want to open my heart to you without getting slapped down for it,” Anders snaps. He shakes out his pants with a snap of his wrist and pulls them on, lacing the front almost violently fast. “Don’t bloody condescend to me just because I have the nerve to be pissed at you. I’m sick of it. I’m sick of you claiming to know my heart then stonewalling me when I try to reach yours. If I had a sovereign for every time you told me I don’t understand you, I’d be as wealthy as Hawke. So, honestly? You can shut up until you have something to say that you’re not going to wield at me like a weapon.”

Fenris sets down the wine. “A hint, mage. You aren’t going to reach it fawning over what I look like, or getting up, or accusing me of lying.”

Anders turns, head lowered, eyes smouldering. He takes one step forward. Then another. Then, with a snarl on his lips, he charges, grabbing for Fenris’s shoulders, forcing him back onto the bed and kissing him with ferocious passion. His lip splits against Fenris’s teeth but he seems not to notice or care.

Fenris makes a breathy sound of surprise, any possible words it could have once been muffled by their mouths smashed against one another. The spontaneity of it catches him off guard enough that it takes him a moment to push back and return the kiss. But his hands react immediately, snapping up to Anders’ wrists to shove the man’s hands off of his shoulders and onto the mattress directly above.

Anders fights. He twists his wrists violently in Fenris’s grasp, showing a committed strength he rarely does. He forces his tongue into Fenris’s mouth and thrusts it deep, while his hands try to grasp wherever they can – Fenris’s wrists, his hair, his arms.

Fenris growls something else equally unintelligible and increasingly frustrated. It seems like it’s the sound itself that sparks his markings to life, veins gaining that vibrant blue haze glow. His hands find Anders’ wrists again, this time hitting like a softened bear trap, and cements them down at his sides. He uses it as leverage as he presses back up against the onslaught, arching his back towards it, and returns the kiss just as aggressively.

Anders struggles just as violently as before, but he can’t break free of Fenris’s grip. He breaks the kiss, turning his face away sharply and gritting his teeth, wedging his knee against the bed to push away.

The change just tightens the grip on Anders’ wrists, though the look Fenris gives him is more baffled than any of the other myriad of emotions he has.. “Are you /mad/?”

“Nothing I do is right, is it? IS IT?!”

“How do you think we’ve gotten this far?” His grip certainly doesn’t move, in fact tightening until it’s the beginnings of painful. “Everything here, and us, is because of you. Stop.”

Anders winces, bones grinding in his wrists. He sucks in a deep breath, holds it, lets it out. And again, his face still turned away. Another slow and measured breath, his head bowed, eyes closed, he is unable to find any words to answer with.

Fenris takes it as a small victory, that he isn’t yelling anymore, and lets out a smaller sigh of his own. “Anders.” He loosens his hands, a hard act of will when the thought of fully letting them go right now could send a shiver down his spine in the worst way. “What do you want from me?”

Anders is silent for a moment, still calming his breathing. His racing pulse begins to slow. “A little tenderness,” he answers. “Reassurance, sometimes. Your words hurt. I wanted to just… play… show you some affection.. I didn’t mean to anger…” He trails off, expression looking drawn and regretful. “I should just reign myself in more. Karl couldn’t stand it when I was like this, either. Cuffed me for it once or twice.”

“I’d thought I’d made myself clear last night.” Fenris wants nothing more than to find Anders’ face with his hands, coax him closer, but finds himself just as pinned as the mage is. Instead he tries the next thing that comes to mind, and his lips so gently press against Anders’ neck, and along it in a trail. “But don’t change. I follow you, and no one else.”

Anders lets out a soft puff of air, his body relaxing at last. He steals a quick kiss, shyly, and leans against Fenris’s chest. “You did… I…” Anders stammers, falters. “It… bears repetition. I don’t understand why my soul has such a long memory for everything that’s ever hurt, and such a short one for anything else.”

Fenris drops his head as Anders relaxes against him, feeling for a moment protective as he lets his lips brush against the blonde, mussed strands of hair. “Regardless of what happens, or, what I might say.. you should trust that. It’s not going to change. Even when I told you to leave.”

Anders leans his head against Fenris’s shoulders while he carefully shifts his weight. He settles again, straddling Fenris’s lap, sighing. “Why?” He asks. There’s no scepticism in his tone, just wonder. “However did I manage to woo you so completely?” He lifts his head, letting Fenris read the bewilderment in his eyes. He wonders if he should start giving himself a bit more credit, if he could manage to reach Fenris that deeply after all.

It’s…. a good question, and one that leaves the elf silent as he tries to pinpoint the strongest reason. “You’re different from the others. You listen to me without backing away. You’re comfortable without being safe.” He glances down then, but less hiding and more trying to be less distracted from his thoughts, eyes still in full view. “No, that was obscure. Because sometimes you make me forget about.. everything. Because you don’t resent what I am. Some part of me doesn’t mind telling you what happened, even if I’m not entirely sure why. And you still manage to laugh, and like your frivolous cats, and help people despite it all with no wants of your own.” A smirk curls the corner of his mouth, and as an afterthought he adds, “It might be obnoxious but your comments about me aren’t entirely unappreciated. Our ‘time together’ has been.. wonderful. And I find you as handsome as you claim that I am.”

Anders is plainly mystified. His mouth drops slightly open, and a pink flush rises in his cheeks. Fenris’s words sink in, perhaps even more deeply than his barbs have been known to. “Then I’ll promise you, if that part of me that laughs isn’t dead yet, it probably won’t ever change. I do have wants of my own… I just..” Anders looks more solemn again as he thinks. “They seem so small and far away, sometimes. I want to be with you… anything I do for you is part of that, too.” He leans in, resting a kiss against Fenris’s lower lip.

Fenris’ mouth parts, jaw dropping a few inches then pressing forward to close into something a bit deeper, tongue separating Anders’ lips. He smiles midkiss, a little humorlessly, breaks it soon but doesn’t make any other move to escape. “I hope you weren’t intending to go anywhere.” His fingers spread in their still solid grip over Anders’ wrists, not quite just referring to anything their dicks get up to.

“No,” Anders answers sheepishly. “In part I’m regretting that I left that comfortable back I was lying on a while ago.” He makes no move to try to pull his wrists out of that grip, though briefly his mind takes a backward glance at the night before, at that confrontational grab at the front of his coat. He wonders, and hopes, that maybe that as well was not meant to assault so much as just to hold. To hold onto him, no matter what. “I think I want you too badly to begrudge myself a day with you.”

Fenris sighs through his nose, tips his head into a small though passionate kiss, uncharacteristically short and shallow. “Good. Because I’m not sure how we’ll get out of this..” As nice as it is right now. “…or your cat might destroy your coat. More.. than it is.” Well it’s true.

“Do we have to get out of this? I’m starting to like it.” Anders is left breathless by the kiss and craving more.

Fenris shifts his weight on the bed under Anders, simultaneously comfortable with the mage but not with his own self-tethering. “The irony isn’t lost on me, but I want to touch you.”

“Do it. I…” Anders pauses, realizing with some solemnity just how seriously Fenris took it when he’d turned his face away. “Forgive me. I’m yours and I want you. Your hands on me, your mouth, everything.”

“I know.” Fenris sighs contently, only to follow it with a self conscious chuckle, and glances down to one of his hands on Anders’ wrists. “Except.. I can’t..”

Anders looks Fenris in the eyes, questioning and solemn. "What’s wrong?“

Fenris’ gaze lingers, the small laugh fading. He forces his hands looser until Anders’ hands are free, though his grip is no less tense. "Just.. don’t touch me.”

Anders draws a slow breath and nods. He leaves his hands where they are at first, leaning his head against Fenris. his ear against Fenris’s chest to listen to his pulse. "I’m sorry,“ he whispers as he draws his hands out of Fenris’s grip, straightening as he does so. He bows his head and crosses his hands behind his back.

Fenris very visibly flinches back as Anders pulls his hands away, breath catching uneasily faster than it was when he was pressed to the elf’s chest, and freezes until they both stay put for a few long moments. With a bit of reluctance he forces himself to sit up, follows the man to press his lips into the small dip at the front of Anders’ neck, and sounds thoroughly frustrated. "Don’t be.”

“Aaahh…” Anders can’t help himself. Fenris’s lips at his neck elicit a welcoming sigh, and he nuzzles against the elf’s silky hair. “Tell me how to help,” he murmurs. “Flames, I love you… You put me in such a state. I never know if I’d rather have my head between your thighs or hips against your rump, so maybe you’re right. I don’t know what I want today except for you.”

Fenris huffs a soft laugh, left feeling so utterly pathetic. “You’ll just have to touch me until I get over it. I don’t see anything else that would help.”

“But what about right now?” Anders ducks his head to kiss Fenris’s chin. “How can I please you, right now?”

Now that he’s finally able to Fenris raises a hand to Anders’ cheek, a thumb along his jaw as he gently lifts the man’s chin to look him in the eyes. “You could do anything and I’d want it.”

Anders answers with a deep kiss, his lips warm and wet, and his tongue willing and yielding. When it ends, he sucks in a quick panting breath, his gaze lingering on Fenris’s beautiful mouth. “Lay back,” he murmurs. “I have something in mind.”

Fenris stares at Anders quizzically for a brief pause, but slowly sinks back to his elbows sinking his weight into the mattress. “Now? …do you ever not have something in mind?” The last statement almost sounds like he’s irritated, save that the rest of him clearly isn’t at all.

 

“And take those off.” Anders rises off the bed and points to Fenris’s snug smallclothes while he struggles out of his pants, shedding them about as quickly as he’d pulled them on. He grabs the oil from the bedstand and straddles Fenris’s hips again, pulling the stopper and pouring into a cupped palm. But that hand doesn’t reach for Fenris. Instead, he reaches back behind his hips, idly chewing his lower lip while he works that slick wetness over and into his own anus.

Fenris rocks his hips to arch them off the bed, the soft curving lines of his bones accentuated with the rise, and hooks a thumb into either side of the black cloth stretched over his hips to push them down past his thighs, eventually off and dropped.. somewhere. Doesn’t matter. He’s only barely distracted but as he settles back into place he stops when his eyes catch on what Anders is doing, lips parting with a small lustful gasp, the barest glint of white from his teeth behind them. He doesn’t even have to say anything, his eyes trailing upward as his cock bobs from watching.

Anders pours more oil into his hand, letting it overflow and spill onto the gorgeous arc of Fenris’s hardon. “Make it ready,” he murmurs. “And hold it straight for me. After that… no hands, without asking first.” There’s a warm but wicked glint in his eye as he arches his spine and works even more lubrication into himself. His gaze looks abstracted, inward-focused on the pleasure he gains from even his own fingers, and for a moment they roll and flutter shut while he quietly moans.

Fenris just.. stares as a hand sinks down to obediently grip his growing erection, palm open as he spreads the oil from the underside to cover the entire shaft, and drags his grip upward to finish the tip. When he’s finished he grips down and strokes himself harder, appreciating the hot slick shaft in his hands and how just enough of it sinks into his skin and makes it velvety underneath it all. With a tiny gulp he looks back up, with a minute nod in agreement.

Anders shifts his knees, one at a time, and then lowers himself down. He pauses when he feels Fenris’s tip nudge up against his entrance, and he spreads himself with his own fingers as he sinks onto that thick erection. The first push he takes slow, eyes shut tight as the tip of Fenris’s cock slides past the tight ring of his anus with a slight pop. He exhales sharply and sinks down further, taking every inch slowly, deliberately, finally moaning when his ass rests on Fenris’s hips, his cock twitching hard from the pressure against his prostate.

Fenris’ jaw drops more noticeably at that, gaping as he looks down, as his hand falls from the base of his erection and just lets Anders impale himself the rest of the way. His brows knit at the sight, teeth closing again and lips tightening into a loose half kiss. A hand slinks onto Ander’s thigh to grip the muscle there without pulling down, then slides farther to the crease of his thigh, fingers pressing along the bone as his thumb halts at the front of it. But reluctantly he complies, and drops his hand away.

Anders leans down, hands pressed into the sheets on either side of Fenris, and he offers him a kiss. His hips begin to raise, then sink again, rolling more than bouncing in long, slow, tight strokes. Anders’s body flexes around the cock inside him, but he concentrates, doing his best to keep himself tight as he can around that thick intrusion, gripping it as his hips lift, bearing down as they drop. He finds a rhythm after a few gyrations, but he keeps the pace slow. His own erection is stiff and dripping over Fenris’s belly.

Fenris arches his hips upward when he can’t stand it, buries himself upward and presses them together. He just lets his mouth drop open again as Anders closes against his lips, and shamelessly moans into it. Every movement is tight against him, drawing out the more vocal sounds and making his cock throb each penetrating stroke in.

Anders swallows Fenris’s moan and answers with one of his own, soft and prolonged as his tongue firms and probes into Fenris’s open mouth. His hips bounce against Fenris is a sudden flurry, and then slow again, returning to that same sensual, deliberate gyration. He realizes with that first quick bounce against Fenris’s hips, that first hard jab against his spot, just how tender he still is from the previous night. Fenris tends to hit him more deeply than he’s ever been used to, and even aside from previous partners he’d spent three years without. He could easily get too much of a good thing, with the elf inside him.

Fenris’ tongue finds Anders’, his small curling movements somehow just as pleading as his hips. He drops back to break the seal between their lips, a thin string of saliva glinting between them as he darts a little lower to draw a few kisses at Anders’ neck. The breath between them falters, gasping as the other man goes faster, and only manages to choke out a meek, “don’t stop.” Anders is, very simply, always a beautiful tease in a way he never even tries to put into words, and now that he’s keeping his hands down he can imagine how the mage feels about him.

“It’s… ah… sweet torture, isn’t it?” Anders whispers in Fenris’s ear. “I need you to trust me…” He chokes out a moan, hips squirming on Fenris’s cock, and he kisses desperately at the side of his neck. “I need you… to hold it back… as long as you can. Tell me when and I’ll slow down to help you. Just keep holding it back, and holding it back… and… something wonderful will happen to you. No magic. Just… just trust me.”

Fenris nods, the response coming out as a shaky nuzzle, his breath heavy against the crook of Anders’ shoulder. He turns his brow against the mage’s neck, making a small gasp for air and instead nearly overwhelmed with the musk of their sex. “Where did you learn this?” Somehow.. he can’t imagine everyone else’s beds being this overwhelmingly beautiful and new each time. He heard some of it from Isabela, granted, but everyone else always acted like it was fantasy, not something that actually happened.

“This… I’ve never done this with anybody but myself…” Anders trails off with a breathless, shaky laugh. He rolls his hips on Fenris in the same slow rhythm, his insides feverish and tight and slick around Fenris’s shaft. “I read about it. Some of the… ahh… specialized… healing grimoires..NNNHH!” Anders groans into the joint of Fenris’s neck and shoulder as he gives a quick, hard flurry at his cock, buttocks slapping hard against Fenris’s hips. “I… have only… only ever tried this on myself… alone… it isn’t magic, it’s … a mental exercise.”

Fenris chokes as a shudder travels up his stomach, his hips grinding upward unconsciously. His jaw drops again and he just leans his lips forward to bring them together in a loose kiss over Anders’ skin, tongue coming forward to taste his sweat. “Wait-” Despite himself as the other man slows he raises a hand to dig into the mage’s hip firmly to drag their movements to a crawl for a moment. His breathing goes ragged as the need subsides, slowly. “Whoever called this healing was lying to you.”

A groan, a muttered, “Oh, fuck…” and Anders keeps himself still, even as his insides tense and roll. “Just … wait,” he whispers, between thirsty kisses at Fenris’s jaw. “Wait and see.” When he moves again, the lift of his hips is even slower than before, and there’s a deliberate pause before he lets himself slide back down. Another pause, and another slow motion, each bit of pressure and friction carefully rationed out.  
“Now listen, love.” Anders’s voice is soft and low, a muted note of desire and need underlying every word. “Close your eyes and focus on your breathing… focus on taking slow, deep, even breaths. No matter how good it starts to feel, just slow, even breaths. And relax your body. Think about your whole body, from your head to your toes, and make every muscle loose and slack, until the only thing tight in you is that spot in and under your cock where you can feel all your pleasure gathering up. think of it as if it’s raining down on you… so much pleasure that you don’t need to try and gather it or hold it, because there are -oceans- of it, and you will have all that you need, all you could ever want, without having to lift even a finger. Now breathe… breathe in…” Anders raises his hips, a long tight drag against Fenris’s cock. “And out…” slowly, he slides back down until his hips rest on Fenris’s again. “Breathe in… and out…”

Fenris is left with his breathing ragged, eyes unfocused as the mage kisses at him before squeezing his eyes shut to concentrate. Gradually his panting and the heartbeat under his chest slows. Each one is a very pointed and halting fight, each intake a sharp, rough edged gasp through his nose, followed by a slow exhale that goes until his lungs threaten him with a soft pain at the base of his throat. “I can see why you haven’t done this to anyone else. It’s torture.” Torture he’s willing to go through, but doesn’t see many others tolerating.

“You’re always in such a hurry,” Anders murmurs with a nuzzle at Fenris’s throat. His hips keep their slow and measured, and he does his best to shrug off his own frustrated urges, his neglected cock rubbing lightly against Fenris’s belly. “Now I want you to concentrate on that one, tight place. Imagine the pleasure in your loins rising up through your body like steam. Rising through your belly, through your chest, through your throat, up through the crown of your head. Like a snake uncoiling along your spine. Let it travel up and infuse all of you as it builds.” Anders’s voice keeps its low, hypnotic quality, “When it reaches the crown of your head… just keep breathing. It will blossom out, you’ll see…”

With their movements under control Fenris’ hand drags up to Anders’ shoulder loosely, and his middle and ring fingers press down as he clings to the man’s skin, the two fingers making drastic angles from the others. He presses his head against the mage’s, faltering gasps and a slowly escaping groan brushing against Anders’ ear. Unexpectedly his lips part with a sound that’s more surprised, and he gives a small thrust upward, pleading as his cock flexes, rock hard and dripping to finish this.

He feels hot, almost boiling hot – a heat that bristles the roots of his silver hair. Anders hunches over his body, riding him faster now, and each plunging stroke along his length makes that serpent, that vine, unfurl a little more. Then Fenris shuts his eyes, and even in the close, warm shadow of his lover’s body, he could swear that he sees white.  
“Feel it. Let it…”  
Fenris opens his mouth as his body curls up from the bed. His shoulders lift, his chin brushes Anders’s loose hair. He feels it. Somehow he’s at his peak and yet… not. Somehow every stroke into Anders’s body is as ecstatic as a final, finishing plunge, yet it doesn’t end. Another thrust, and another… it doesn’t end. “H-how….?!” His eyes are opened wide again, but he can keep no focus. All he sees is the sunlight flooding the room like molten gold.  
Anders snaps his hips down, riding -hard-. His mouth leaves a warm, wet kiss on the side of Fenris’s neck and he straightens his body, arching back as he strokes himself in a desperate fury, until he tightens with a choked cry and spills his seed onto Fenris’s chest and stomach. His insides milk Fenris’s cock in tight, rolling spasms, a final buck and roll of Anders’s hips making that unfurled pleasure snap tight again and break, finishing Fenris at last.

The sweetly clinging touch at Anders’ shoulder sinks, palm enveloping as much as it can spread over as it clamps down, mirroring the pressure at his hips. Fenris’ head drops back as his throbbing cock drives upward, spilling into the mage as his eyes clamp shut again in his moment of ecstasy. Small shudders rack up from his stomach to his chest and lungs, waves of flexing muscles under Anders, and he’s left struggling for air again. “Anders, I…” He just trails off, realizing that he’s trying to form a coherent sentence way too soon.

Anders’s hips jerk a couple more times, the soft gasping sounds from his mouth turning sweet, then almost pained. He falls forward, taking his weight on his hands, then lowering himself onto Fenris, panting and shuddering, and giving a sharp moan as Fenris’s cock pulls free of his body with a soft, wet pop. His breathing turns slower and deeper against Fenris’s neck, but even he can’t seem to manage words yet.

For a few long moments pass, the both of them simply panting and practically steaming with bodyheat against each other. Fenris’ grip loosens as the last bit of his energy wanes, and slips to vaguely circling Anders’ wrist. He’s not completely sure how much time passes, never actually losing consciousness but content to catnap for at least a minute, the faint throbbing of his dying orgasm to the weight of the man on top of him satisfying. “Why did you want to do that?” Surely there’s some reason beyond, it’s wonderful. Seems specific.

“A few reasons.” Anders’s voice is soft and his words slurred from the aftermath of exhausting pleasure. “To show you how it feels to have to restrain myself from touching you. To make it last, and show you some of the rewards of taking your time. To see how far you’d be willing to place your trust in me… and to try and make you feel very, very good.”

Fenris knits his brows at that, eyes still closed. “You already know that I trust you, don’t be daft.” A slow, long sigh of air escapes his nose along with the rest of his energy. With it, a small idea registers with Anders’ words. “Touch me now.” Maybe he’ll be altogether too tired to care.

 

Anders strokes his half-curled fingers along Fenris’s jaw. "I know. But I like to see it, too.“ Anders rolls half off of Fenris, but keeps himself draped over him, snug and close against his side and enjoying their shared warmth. He wants to mouth the words "You’re so beautiful” but he keeps it to himself for now, knowing roughly what the answer will be. Instead, he smiles.

Fenris flinches at the touch. It would be too much a fantasy that the issue would be gone completely, but after the small twich at his jaw he doesn’t pull away any farther. There’s some annoyance to his voice, but it’s anything to distract himself from putting all his focus on the hand. “You see it every moment I let you stay here.”

“Then maybe I just take some enjoyment from holding the reins on your pleasure now and then. Forgive me if that’s a bit a sordid, but it’s… gratifying.” Anders’s fingers uncurl, caressing the side of Fenris’s face, thumb stroking once slowly across his lower lip. "Do you object?“

Fenris finally cracks his eyes open, leveling a gaze on the mage past his fingers that might be a glare if it wasn’t so sleepy and the elf’s stomach not a complete mess. "I wouldn’t be here if I did.”

Anders is still smiling. "Love. It would be nice sometimes if you would, every once in a while, say something positive, instead of telling me that a lack of violent protest should substitute for praise. If I took every moment of your silence as a ringing endorsement of my doings, I think my ego would bloat uncontrollably.“

"Then imagine I’m always thinking of new ways to insult you, you’re bad enough as it is.” Fenris’ words are punctuated with a tiny smirk though, and he turns his head towards Anders’ hand purposefully. There’s still a painfully acute awareness of the very tips of the man’s fingers, but the movement is enough to make the rest of it more comfortable, that small defining edge between being touched and touching making all the difference.

Anders’s playful grin turns tender. "That must be a challenge. I think you’ve run through just about all the insults there are. You’re charting entirely new verbal territories, my love.“ He turns his hand, brushing the side of his palm against Fenris’s cheek and neck.

Fenris has settled to reacting even less, though he can feel it’s wholly contingent on whether Anders will pick up his hand or not. And talking helps. He props his elbow from the arm farther from the mage back, scowling a little at his stomach before turning his head towards Anders. Every action has become careful, trying to not break contact or even threaten it. "You’d be surprised.”

Anders lets his gaze follow as his hand trails slowly down. He shivers visibly. After so long having to deny himself, having to steal the occasional caress, the feeling of Fenris’s skin under his hand is intoxicating. Without breaking contact, he shifts his body against Fenris, lowering his lips to lap up some of the cooling jism on his chest.

A deep core in Fenris’ chest tightens, the tiniest shudder but otherwise unprotesting. His breath grows heavier than he even has energy to as he watches for a brief pause, then glances away. “We do have towels, you know.” Not at all suggested because he’s blushing, of course not.

“They don’t love you as much as I do,” Anders quips after taking a quick peek at Fenris’s flushed cheeks. He begins lapping his way slowly down Fenris’s belly, his hand trailing down alongside his eager mouth.

A path of tightened muscle leads wherever the hand moves, but he breathes a slow and deliberate sigh as he tolerates it. His head drops back, still turned to one side, the only way he can at all hide the color on his cheeks that he gets all the more self conscious about once the mage has seen them, and grumbles. “That was the idea.”

“You are kind to humor this love-starved Apostate,” Anders says with a sigh. His hand moves even lower, cupped over Fenris’s groin and hefting slightly. Anders can’t entirely pass up the chance to get the measure of Fenris by touch at long last. And the weight in his hands is satisfying. “Has anyone ever told you you’re big? Especially for an elf.”

Fenris’ head snaps back up at that, the blush fading for a more idle wariness, and a self conscious feeling that agitates more than embarrasses. He shifts his hips a bit, unsure of how he feels to being a bit obviously objectified. “If you hadn’t noticed, I’m tall. For an elf.”

Anders sighs, exhaling a puff of air through his nose. His expression is instantly contrite, though he doesn’t take his hand away. “…Sorry. Isabela told me your dick was one of the only things you’d ever accept a compliment about. That and, as usual, I’m not nearly as charming as I think I am…”

“If you listened to Isabela you /must/ be desperate. It doesn’t work when you’re bigger than I am.” By far, he doesn’t add. Or at least it feels like it, since he realizes they haven’t compared together. Not that he’d be eager to… this is too much complexity dedicated to comparing sizes, isn’t it. “As long as you’re enjoying yourself.”

“Why yes, as luck would have it you are rather difficult to please.” Anders lets his touch trail along Fenris’s thigh and then back up before he finally takes his hand away. He rests his head on Fenris’s belly, angled to let him smile a bit impishly up at the elf.

“I know what you think when it’s plastered to your face, you don’t have to say anything for me to appreciate it.” Fenris’ breathing has fallen slower and steady in his stomach, a slow rise and fall as he regards the man with his half lidded deep green eyes. Somehow they smile without him having to, before there’s the tiniest crease between them. “How do you know I’m big for an elf?”

“I’d love to make up a tale of wild sexual exploits, but it’s really just that there was no privacy in the apprentice quarters. The bunks were stacked three high and we had maybe half a dozen chamber pots to share between us.” Anders wrinkles his nose. “All of us knew more about one another than we really cared to. When I got returned to Quarters after escape, er… number three it was.. one of the new boys actually introduced himself to my crotch. I was toweling off my hair and he looks down at my smalls and says ‘You must be that Anders.’ And that’s when I realized I had a …reputation.”

“And that /didn’t/ lead to anything. How wasted, for being so spoken of.” Fenris will never admit it but being called big is one thing, knowing it’s indirectly referencing an entire circle is.. well, it’s another. Fenris gulps, silent enough that it’s likely unnoticed.

Anders laughs a bit nervously. “Maybe. At the time I was mainly… mortified. Some of the other apprentices would make jokes about pinning me to my bunk and fetching a yardstick, which they all found terribly funny but I didn’t, because I knew I’d end up doing my best to kill someone.” Anders frowns, then kisses Fenris’s belly and eases.

Fenris watches Ander’s change, eyes silently critical to the details. His stomach goes taught under Anders’ lips only to relax immediately after, a bit like a reversed ripple of water, the motion casting a bit of air from his lungs. “You were so bothered by other mages?” Here he had expected some sort of small camaraderie. But he drops it with a half shrug, the most he can really do in this position. “I was separated from the other slaves.”

“We lived together because we were forced to, not by choice. That situation can get sour in a hurry. For the most part we tried to watch out for one another but there were rivalries, enemies, jealousies, and also the occasional party and a couple of secret orgies in the rooftop gardens. Anything you would expect from people… not all of it good and not all of it bad. I had some friends but I wasn’t really -close- with anyone. Except Karl.” Anders pauses, looking up again along Fenris’s body. "Might have been for the best. I can imagine Hadriana wasn’t the only person to be jealous of you for being the favorite.“

Fenris just gets a small dangerous glint in his eye at the sound of her name. "I would’ve been able to deal with them, slaves are housed together when they’re easily replaced.” Which was, for the most part, always. “Hadriana… I couldn’t fight back and I couldn’t tell Danarius. She did what she wanted.”

“Did she always have such bad breath? She was facing me and casting something towards the end there and whoof, it was like being back in the bone pit mines.” While joking there’s an edge in Anders’s tone, something about the combination of the two suggesting he’s angrier at the now-dead woman than he’s ready to admit to.

“I.. hadn’t noticed. Or it had gotten worse after I left.” Fenris entertains that thought the most, that Danarius had been angry enough to take it out on her for his bodyguard’s absence and she in turn deteriorated as late revenge. It was better than simply killing her. “I didn’t want to kill her. But I had to.”

“You didn’t want to?” Anders shifts against Fenris, scooting up to cuddle in the crook of his arm, head resting against his shoulder. They’d never had the opportunity to discuss what had happened with Hadriana.

Fenris cants his head to one side as he thinks, eyes flicking to Anders’ shoulder, quiet for a couple seconds. “I don’t know. I wanted her to feel the way I had, tell Danarius I had defeated her and not some pack of coast marauders.”

“That makes sense. You wanted her to taste defeat. Does it mean anything that you know you had her beaten, even if Danarius doesn’t?”

Fenris’ gaze drops farther, from the shoulder to the bedsheet at their side, then it finally returns to land on the mage’s eyes.. “Only that she won’t be able to hurt anyone else.”

Anders looks back into those eyes, calm. “I’m glad. Maker, how could I have been so wrong about you when first we met.” Anders smiles tenderly and sighs. “You’ve a gentle soul. You just lived in a place that forced you to act otherwise.”

Fenris closes his eyes and sighs, a little too content than he was aiming for. “Hardly. Don’t worry, I still hate mages.”


	25. Chapter 25

It’s silently off-putting, in a way that picks at the back of his mind without bringing immediate concern, that Fenris and Anders have fallen into a sort of routine. Which isn’t to say much, beyond that they manage to crawl out of bed at what Aveline called a ‘vaguely decent’ hour of the morning and Orana manages to get food into them before Anders heads to the clinic.

 

It hasn’t been going on long. It rubs him the wrong way but he sees no alternative, right now. And it does manage to give him some of the solitude he wants.  
He waits for Orana to leave for the market before he practically slinks into the study. That he doesn’t like it there is an understatement, as if the books themselves could betray his location to Danarius just for being related to magic, but this is the only place completely made for writing. And finally, he’s relatively sure he can write without awkwardly bugging anyone.

The front door opens and shuts. Anders leans his staff against the wall and then leans back against the door, his heart pounding from a combination of panic, and a fair bit of running. When he had reached the clinic, Templars were already there. They hadn’t noticed him, and he hadn’t stuck around long, but he had seen them questioning his volunteers before he’d turned and ran. They had covered for him before and he had no reason to believe they wouldn’t now, and for that he was grateful. But nothing would be done in the clinic today. It was time to choose a new location. Anders wiped the sweat from his forehead and straightened his bedraggled coat as it occurred to him to wonder what Fenris was up to. Maybe if he kept very quiet he would catch him dancing.

The bad thing about living with other people is that every single time Fenris hears the front door his ear pricks to catch the sound no matter how faint or where he is in the mansion, and the hair at the back of his neck stands on end knowing full well that this time it could be slavers. It’s very precisely the reason why he doesn’t come out to greet anyone, not that it’s in his nature to anyway, and why a few of Hawke’s friends find it necessary to announce themselves plainly once the door closes behind them. He’s… grateful, for that.  
But he continues writing, momentarily forgetting the fact that he doesn’t particularly want to be found in here or with this paper, for the more important instinct that his less dominant hand is tightening it’s grip on the sword laying flat on the table. This is as good a place as any to bunker down and listen to what’s out there, the only thing to give away his position a faint light escaping to the open door that he’d been using to write by, even visible in the hall during the day. But that just proves someone lives here, not that he’s in the room at the right now.

Is that a light on in his study? Anders looks toward the corridor curiously and starts over. Fenris is probably practicing his reading, he realizes, and he can’t help smiling at the thought. With how nervous Fenris had been at the start, he’d moved on to tackle the problem relentlessly, applying all his focus, wits, and determination to learning and improving. It impressed him, and it delighted him. His lover was brave and brilliant, as well as gorgeous, passionate, and sublimely wonderful. Anders shakes his head a bit, wondering how it can be that he isn’t getting less besotted over time, but somehow more.

Somewhere in the short time it takes to cross the mansion, /something/ in the sound tips Fenris off who it is. He’s not even sure what it was, but his nerves ease immediately with the conclusion. Once they’re cooling, this mental distraction pulls away like a curtain on the fact that he’s here, in the study, where he has some small feeling of not wanting to be caught dead alone in. But Anders is too close to claim anything else, so instead he stands and sidesteps away from the desk chair as the mage comes through the doorway, instead faintly poking over the spines of books on the shelf.

Anders leans against the doorjamb, smiling. When he thinks back to how he’s nearly sprinted home, it’s almost surreal how calm he feels knowing Fenris is here. "Looking for something to read?“

Fenris nods simply, still picking over the books even as a faint unease settles. "I haven’t finished the last one. I was.. curious, since it’s easier to see the names now.” It’s only partly untrue. Mainly because he already did just that when nobody was around.

“I used to hate books,” Anders says, stepping into the room and shutting the door softly behind him. “Thought – rather, I assumed they were boring. I learned to read in the Circle. There… well, some of the books were boring. But they were also the only window to the outside world some of us had.”

Fenris silently curses at the closed door, though he doesn’t show it. The longer they linger the more time Anders has to pick up on the written page that he definitely didn’t pen, on his desk and only marginally hidden behind a pile of books on the desk’s edge. Though if they left the room he would still be stuck, with the mage around and having to find his way back into the study.  
Fenris drops his hand from the bookshelf, with a small sigh to pointedly silence his mind of this nonsense, and instead levels a very lazily withering look on Anders for causing all this. “Aren’t you supposed to be at your clinic?”

Anders leans against the desk, smiling at first, but then hanging his head at Fenris’s mild remonstration. "Not while the Templars are raiding it, no. We’ll have to — what’s this?“ Anders tilts his head, finally noticing the parchment on the desk. He turns it upright relative to himself, so he can read it.

Fenris’ eyes trail down as if he isn’t already aware of what’s there, verifying exactly what Anders is looking at. Of course, he’s too far away to make a grab at it. "It.. could be Orana’s.” He thinks back, trying to remember if he made direct mention of himself yet.

“She knows how to write?” Anders is sceptical, obviously. And it only takes a brief moment of thinking back to realize that Fenris was trying awfully hard to look like he wasn’t doing anything when he walked in. "Your handwriting’s gotten better,“ he comments dryly.

Fine. "I’d hope so. Do you always pry into other people’s things?” The reply isn’t completely sharp edged, as much as Fenris would like it to be he’s also fully aware of how hypocritical it makes him.

Anders hears the bit of faltering in Fenris’s growl and he grins broadly. "No, love, only yours. Only yours.“ Anders walks around the desk to sit, somewhat sprawled, in his chair. With a twinkle in his eye he holds out his arms, inviting Fenris to sit in his lap. "So, do you want to tell me what this is?” he says, expecting the answer 'No.’

It would be too much to assume Fenris could bring himself to just flop on top of Anders like some huge cat, but in a bit of negotiation he comes closer and lets himself lean down as his palms prop against the arm of the chair. “Not particularly.” Well it’s a letter, obviously enough. Just not nearly finished.

Anders looks the parchment over and answers his own question. “You’re writing to your sister. You know where to reach her?” Anders raises his head, pleased to find that Fenris’s isn’t too far away.

Fenris simultaneously sighs and looks away, though his eyes just land on the letter instead of wandering too far. “..Yes. It’s stupid, and it feels like a trap.” His voice softens at that, “Yet I’m doing it anyway.”

“I hope it isn’t. I hope this brings something of your past back to you.” Anders carefully sets the parchment back where he found it. “If you want my help, you have it. Anything, big or small.”

From how much Fenris has picked up on his own, or forced himself to, it’s hard to imagine him asking for help. But when it’s offered so bluntly and the letter is right there… he waves his hand at it vaguely. “Well?”

“You misspelled this,” Anders says, pointing to a word near the beginning. “And while this one is correct it’s an archaic spelling. May as well leave it be, though. You’ve learned a lot, very quickly.”

He’s right, rewriting the entire thing over two mistakes would be going a bit far. Fenris shrugs lamely, with the faintest hint of frustration toning his voice. “It doesn’t seem like it. There are still words I miss when I’m reading.”

“You’re very demanding of yourself, to expect to be perfect at something you learned a few weeks ago.” Anders speaks softly and in earnest. “What I’ve seen of how hard you push yourself, and how far you’ve come, impresses me every time I think about it. I should try to face my problems with the same sort of dauntless courage.”

Fenris just puffs a small snort at that. “Your problems aren’t simply ink and paper.”

“I suppose not. Allow me to be inspired by you, regardless."Anders gives Fenris a warm smile and shifts in his chair. "I’ll let you have the desk back. I’ll be here reading if you want any help from me.” He picks up his inkwell and sloshes it to check its contents. “I should cook up more ink this evening.”

Fenris drops to his elbows. “What are you going to do about the clinic?”

“The volunteers and I are going to meet tomorrow at Lirene’s. We’ll discuss other locations and work on getting set up. If the Templars took anyone, I’ll talk to Hawke and Aveline about getting them back.” Anders sighs. “They probably plundered my potions again. I’m going to be brewing all week. I’ll set up elsewhere in the house, I don’t want to stink up Orana’s kitchen.”

Fenris scrunches his nose with a small look of disgust, though he tries to hide it barely a moment later. Oh yes, he knows full well the 'interesting’ smells that come out of that. He sighs, but it’s more of a purposeful in and exhale to clear his memory. “The ceiling to the storage room collapsed at some point…” And that’s why he’s kept that door closed, other than the fact that none of them have ever needed storage space in an entire mansion.

“Could work. Maybe I’ll take over Hawke’s kitchen instead. The neighborhood association would think twice about knocking down his door. But the best option would be to find a place by the docks I can squat in for a week or two. Nobody would notice smell there, and the smoke wouldn’t lead the Templars here or to wherever we settle the new clinic.” Anders rises from the chair and slips around Fenris, offering him a kiss as he does so. He scoops up a couple of books and settles himself in that particular spot on the floor Fenris tended to favor, then shrugs out of his coat to read.


	26. Chapter 26

Varric’s rooms at the Hanged Man have a card table big enough to accommodate the whole crew, especially if some of them sit shoulder to shoulder. This is one of the rare nights where -everyone- has gathered. Aveline and Donnic, Hawke nearly sticking to Isabela’s ample hip, Varric, Merrill, Sebastian, Anders and Fenris. Even Orana has come, though she’s spectating rather than playing, having made the wise choice to learn the game before she starts wagering on it. 

 

The last hand has been played, though, and the winnings split between Fenris and Hawke. Anders was tapped out a while ago, though he had managed to stay in the game longer than usual, determined not to be -totally- embarrassed in front of his lover. Orana had taken pity when he’d tapped out, and brought him a warm cider. It had never occurred to Anders on his own to try something from the bar that wasn’t alcohol… it was surprisingly good and rather consoling. But all the rest of the drinks had been stiff ones, and Anders had his coat open to try and let in some air. Though the room seemed nearly as warm as his flushed skin.  
“Now,” Varric said as he tapped his playing cards back into a neat stack. "Who’s up for another game?“ He was slipping the cards back into their carved box, however, something that everyone took notice of without him explicitly pointing it out. "The evening’s still young and most of you don’t look nearly drunk enough for this hour. But don’t worry, I’ve got a fix in mind.” Varric sits back, gazing across the table over steepled fingers.

Fenris sinks back in his chair a little, so exactly the opposite from Isabela’s interested lean forward with her elbows dropping onto the table. Their expressions are similarly both smug, the elf’s a sharp and subdued glance up towards the dwarf while Isabela’s is plastered across her smile despite not being the direct winner. The only thing that could have made them a more perfect tableau would have been if they were seated directly opposite each other.  
“Before Hawke leaves the table penniless, you mean?”  
It’s actually Fenris who’s piped up of the two, Isabela momentarily distracted and the contrast between them lost as her humored focus turns to Sebastian and Donnic looking the slightest uneasy from the cards leaving the table. Oh, she knows why too. “Aw boys, didn’t like that game of strip poker did you?”  
Sebastian stands a tad abruptly at that, catching the party’s attention though Donnic almost ready to join him. The only, and best, thing that keeps him here is Aveline. “Young but I should call it a night all the same, I’m afraid.”

Norah slips into the room as Sebastian is on his way out, compelling him to pause and bow awkwardly while she ignores him completely and squeezes through the doorframe. The templar is both a tee-totaller and a lousy tipper, and as such not exactly popular in the Hanged Man. She does spare a smile for Donnic and Aveline as they rise, and she sets down two heavy growlers of the tavern’s best ale. Still not great in flavor but at least it’s potent.  
“Enough for me for one night, Varric. Thank you for the invitation all the same,” Aveline pushes out of her chair and slips a hand in Donnic’s, their fingers weaving together. Varric gives them each a nod, managing to wear the perfect combination of disappointment and cordial understanding on his face. It’s moments like this when one can tell he’s a noble… a properly housebroken one, too.  
As chairs open up at the table, Orana slips into one of them, her embroidery hoop in her hands. "This is a game not played with cards? If it isn’t too hard I could play with you…“  
"Of course you can, Honeybee,” Varric says with the beginnings of a grin. "It’s easy. We go in turns. When it’s your turn, you pick somebody to square off against. Then you make a statement about that person’s past, a … an educated guess, let’s say, not something you already know for certain. If it’s true, they drink. If you’re wrong, you drink.“

Fenris settles into his position in his chair, the initial lean backward really committing itself as he picks up his mug and takes a small drink from it. "I’m not playing.”  
Merrill chirps up from her chair, starting to lean in almost conspiratorially towards the table, both hands setting onto the wood edge in front of her. “Oh Fenris, but it sounds so fun! And you have an advantage you know, ‘I can’t remember…’.”  
Isabella drops back but her smile no less smug than before, and leans a hair closer to Hawke as she does. “It’s alright. We promise we’ll be gentle. And you can’t just stay to listen in on Anders, that’s cheating.”  
The elf just hits her with a withering look for that. “I’m not.”  
“So it’s settled then!”

“Maybe no one will pick you to bother. Anyhow, as long as there are free drinks involved, count me in.” Anders sits back, his arms open and hitched back over the back of his chair and his knees splayed apart, the entire pose insolently comfortable. There’s a smile on his lips and his eyes have an inviting darkness to them, hedging closely on the sort of sated look they get after sex as he trains them on Fenris and gives him a leisurely, if brazenly obvious, once-over. "It’s not as though you have the most colorful past out of the lot of us. I’m a much better target for anybody looking to laugh rather than cry.“  
Norah fills the alemugs around the table, finishing with Varric’s very own, personal, especially large and especially dwarven tankard. He slips a silver coin discretely into her hand, and she curtsies to him on the way out the door, shutting it softly behind. "Now,” says Varric. "Any volunteers or do we throw some dice for the first turn.“

Merrill seems, so amazingly, completely oblivious to Anders being anything but normal. Fenris does too, but it’s more of a very aware but pointed ignoring.  
"Oh Fenris I’ll ask you something don’t worry. Is your favorite color black?”  
“No.”  
“Aw, and I thought I was giving us an easy one.” She obediently takes a drink, a small thing that’ll take her a million years to get drunk on if at all. She expects to loose a lot tonight, if that was any indication. “Oh I’m horrible at this game already, Orana you try. You know him better don’t you, house an’ all?”  
Isabela takes a bigger swig than Merrill does, nobody said anything about drinking in between, and smiles with a rare moment of genuine curiosity, voice a tad lower into a loud mutter below the 'official game’. “What /is/ your favorite color?”  
“…green.”

Satisfied enough with that Isabela immediately straightens, swirls her mug as if she hadn’t just taken a drink, and points a finger in Anders’ direction. “/You/ were the one that stole the three nugs from The Pearl and put them in a Templar’s bedroom, weren’t you?”

Anders smiles archly and puts his cup to his lips as he nods. “I was doing the man a favor, really. Also, those were some very well-trained nugs. You’ll recall he didn’t put them to the sword.” Anders turns to Merrill and looks her over speculatively. “Alright, I have one for you, Merrill. You’ve never sucked a dick in your life, but you have something at home you practice on.” It’s obvious where Anders’s mind is right about now.  
Merrill’s cheeks burn. She pouts, but she takes a drink. “Oh, so this is one of -those- games, I should have known when I saw Isabela smiling. I will say somebody someday is going to be happy I made the effort.”  
Orana is doing a very good job keeping a straight face and somehow not blushing at all. Tevinter may be a very proper and civilized place on the surface, but Orana is still very experienced in the art of overhearing flustering things and acting as if she’s heard nothing. Her needle dives and rises through the cloth stretched over her hoop, only a tiny quirk of a smile betraying her.

Merrill manages to compose herself again, and snaps for another easy one. She’s determined, just win once and she can drink all her losses away happy, as she waves a small gesture towards Isabela. “But you don’t remember how many you’ve had, I bet.”  
Isabela just replies proudly, “Not a clue.” And drinks, before tapping the mug down. Her gaze shifts between Anders and Fenris, and settles on the elf first. “You’ve slept with one more before me. That night was /good/, there’s no way you had that much natural talent.”  
Before he can answer she pulls the mug more towards Anders. “And you’ve been with……” Isabela sucks in a breath through her teeth as her mind speculates a number out of the air, like guessing beans in a container. “-six people, but more of them didn’t matter as much than did.”  
It’s too specific and she’s fine with that, but the surprise comes when she falls silent and Fenris doesn’t respond. “/Really?/” But she takes a swig all the same, and watches the mage past the mug so she can just know to keep drinking or not.

Anders looks at least as curious as he narrows his eyes in Fenris’s direction. But then Isabela’s question distracts him, and with a look of concentration he mutters to himself as he counts off on his fingers. One is easy. He hesitates briefly and two and three curl down. Another hesitation and he comments, “Glory Holes don’t count, that’s just a kind of masturbation.” Then a glance at Isabela as a fourth curls down. “I suppose you do. And I suppose we’re including Fenris and not just talking about before, so…” A fifth. And then a sour frown. A sixth, with no comment. He picks up his mug and drinks. “Good guess.”  
“As for him I think at least two before you, Isabela. And in one case there wasn’t any ‘sleeping with’ exactly but I don’t know what technicality he’s using to wiggle out on the other. As for you…” Anders smiles crookedly. “You were married to a man who never gave you an orgasm.”

Fenris’ gaze flicks towards the mage, faintly irritated with the game already, but at least he’s good enough for a formal answer this time. “Drink.”  
Isabela waves a hand. “Too easy! I think I need four for that one just to forget.” The words are punctuated with just that as she tips the mug back and drinks heavily, only to add as she comes up for air, “Got me and not your own man? Tsk, ouch. I already know that Hawke tried having a boyfriend once and it didn’t last long.” Actually she has no idea, and glances to him all too eagerly.  
Merrill is… well she’s really intent to listen, if not without a small hint of jealousy, but gets held up. “What’s a /Glory Hole/?”

Anders faces down Fenris with a hint of a defiant pout but he drinks. "You know you don’t have to get me drunk to indulge your every whim, love.“ He sighs and glances across the table to where Garrett blushes and coughs into his fist.   
"Once I tried to move beyond the physical, I discovered there wasn’t much there,” he comments. "One for Varric,“ he adds, raising a finger before Isabela can say anything, but wrapping his arm around her waist as he continues. "You may be a mystery wrapped in an enigma, my friend, but you…. have had a girlfriend in the Coterie.”  
Varric shakes his head and tsks, then lifts his tankard for a deep drink. "You noticed I always start out aiming for the kneecaps with them. Damn. She’s not in the city anymore but you know me… a heart as soft as basket of kittens.“  
"She was Bianca’s namesake!” Anders blurts out excitedly.  
“Drink, Blondie. And then drink again, because Anders isn’t your real name.”  
Anders drinks several heavy swallows, setting his mug down empty. He stands up to pour for himself and top off the rest of the table.

As much as Fenris doesn’t seem to be enjoying the game, he sure shoves his mug a few inches closer to Anders to have the ale topped off before taking a small drink from it. “You’re the one playing.”  
Isabela follows suit with her fresh mug, mostly to catch the foam before it topples over one corner of the glass, her breasts pressed against the table in her rush before she sits up again. “And while I’m at it, Merrill, you’ve thought about women before. But you haven’t thought past thinking girls are pretty.”  
“Oooh fine.” Merrill takes a sip. “I really wouldn’t know what to do. But you know exactly, don’t you?”  
Isabela just nods with her losing swig, turns her attention back to Fenris. “The only thing you like as much as the sex is the arguments.”  
The elf just sighs heavily and lifts his mug.

Anders watches with a stymied look on his face, not sure at all what to think about that. Hopefully that doesn’t imply Fenris doesn’t like the snuggling. But maybe not liking the snuggling as much as the sex is reasonable, given that the sex is volcanic. "I should read you my manifesto. You’d come buckets over that.”  
“Anders isn’t Anders?” Merrill looks up over the rim of her mug. "I bet you keep your real name a secret because it’s embarrassing. Something horrid like… Pistachio, or Humperdink.“  
Anders blinks owlishly at Merrill and takes a sip. "Yes, but after those guesses Theuderic doesn’t seem nearly as bad.”  
Isabela rolls her eyes. "I hope your parents weren’t surprised you turned out to be a mage, with a name like that.“  
"Drink. They were.”  
“That wasn’t part of the game but technicalities count, I suppose. I can be a sport.” Isabela lifts her mug.

Merrill is silent about it, but the way her eyes cast up at nothing in particular towards the ceiling it’s clear enough that she’s debating the name over before she comes to a conclusion and her eyes fall back to the other mage. “Well I think it sounds adorable.”  
Fenris raises an eyebrow. Is there something wrong with liking the arguments? Apparently. Surely he’ll hear about it later when they’re too drunk to be coherently awake, at this rate. “I’d rather not repeat what we’ve been through already.” Namely the part where they nearly left each other. But then, mind going silent, he adds, “Theuderic?”  
Merrill leans a bit forward to watch Fenris try the name, fingers curling around her ale. “It’s a bit funny on the tongue isn’t it?”  
“…'funny on the tongue’?”  
“Well you know, like as if your tongue had a big fluffy sweater over it?”  
“No.”

Anders is slightly on edge, hearing his real name in other people’s mouths for the first time in many years. And then Fenris says it and he could swear the room pitches to one side. He grips the sides of his chair, his face reddening so rapidly it stings as if it had been slapped. Isabela leans forward, watching unabashedly, even sharing a knowing grin with Hawke.  
“But that’s not all of it,” Isabela says. "You’ve got a surname too.“  
Anders bows his head and meekly adds ”…Rathskeller. Theuderic Rathskeller.“ Even his ears are red. He’s certain the last time he introduced himself like this, he was still in shackles, brought before the Apprentice messhall on his first day in Kinloch.  
"I think Blondie needs a minute to collect himself,” Varric says. "So… let me see. Honeybee, you’ve been awfully quiet over there.“  
Orana lifts her head, large eyes blinking innocently at Varric. She couldn’t have been trying to fade conveniently to the background, could she? "I’ve been listening,” she says.  
“Good, because here’s one for you. You may have been born a slave, but your parents, at least one of them was born free.”  
Orana nods, taking her cup and sipping it delicately. "My mother was free, before I was born.“ There’s a shadow of sorrow in her expression for a moment, but it’s soon replaced with pride. "They wanted me to be free and now I am.” At that, Varric raises his tankard to her, the others lifting their mugs to join him.  
“Oh, and now I may try one? Fenris… likes mages, and that’s some of what he hates them for. I hope that’s not too dirty.”

Fenris freezes, and for a split second it looks like he has something truly horrible to say, but it falters just as instantly for a grumble. “Exceptions don’t mean I like something.” Whether his throat has run dry or counts that as close enough for her, he takes a drink. The truth of the matter is just mentioning that much leaves him a little uneasy, and he shifts in his chair in an effort to shake it off.  
As the silence continues for a few longer moments than she cares for Isabela pipes up. “Speaking of, Varric. All those times you 'overhear’ something, you did no such thing. You’re making the lot of it up.” She tips her mug a little in a point towards the dwarf at the head of the table, idly lifting the tankard’s stone edge from the table as she’s fully ready to chug it all down, “Then everyone gasps in awe of how you knew. /That’s/ why you haven’t been playing.”  
Merrill watches, almost enchanted. “All that?”  
“/And/, we’re all just a bunch of open books. We’re just playing this game to amuse ourselves.”  
Well if she’s still good for anything it’s a distraction. Fenris’ eyes turn upward toward the woman at some point during this longwinded proclamation. “You just want to drink.”  
“Oh, if I just wanted to drink you’d know. Hawke diddles his dog more than me.” And with that she starts drinking, but not without a corner of her gaze turned towards Hawke.

Varric leans back in his chair and drinks while Isabela chides him. “Can you really blame me? Isn’t it nice, just talking like this?”  
Hawke, a thoroughly amused grin on his face, drinks too. Just to see if Isabela will spit. Varric and Anders both laugh aloud at that. “Now that gig is up, maybe we should part ways for the evening. Unless any of you would rather stick around to help me finish the ale,” Varric adds. Anders slams back his mug and then reaches for a refill, only to have Varric tap him on the wrist. “That’s enough for you, Blondie, this is stronger than the stuff you’re used to. Walk it off for a while and come back if you really want more.”  
“It is a little warm in here,” Anders admits, tugging at the ragged neck of his tunic. He pushes back his chair and stands up, suddenly remembering that instant where the room had tilted over earlier. It felt like the floor wasn’t entirely level, though he did a decent job of not weaving where he stood. “Orana, are you coming back to hightown?”  
The elf shakes her head, looking up from her embroidery again. “I’m staying with Merrill tonight. She’s going to show me pictures of Halla. I’ve never seen one before.”

Merrill nods enthusiastically. “They’re so pretty, someday you will. I’ll make sure of it.”  
Isabela chokes mid-chug, slams the ale down as she takes a moment before managing to swallow. Thank the maker, because she can’t help but giggle a bit at Orana’s response. “Really Anders, can you blame her?” She jabs a thumb in the air backwards towards Hawke. “Between those two and Mabari Lover over here, Hightown gets louder than a pair of dragons in heat.” But with that she reluctantly stands. “…aaand I think I’ll be joining that party, nothing like being drunk and sloppy.”  
And with the news that Orana is parting ways Fenris stands too, looking less unsteady. Could just be hiding it, not like his mood ever changes much from silently angry in public. He is a little relieved that Orana’s not joining their walk home though, if only because he doesn’t want her clinging to them all the time. Not that he’d say it, she’d take it the wrong way.


	27. Chapter 27

As they make their way back to Hightown together, Anders realizes that he is, in fact, piss drunk. He catches himself against a wall once or twice when he stumbles, and on a couple of occaisions realizes he’s singing and shuts himself up for fear of drawing a crowd of eager cutthroats. Even though he sobers a bit on thw way, he’s still hapilly and comfortable drunk when they reach the manor, and Anders pushes open the heavy front door.

 

“You know, love,” he says as he steps aside, inviting Fenris to enter first with a somewhat theatrical sweep of one arm, “I’d rather assumed from the way you talked about them that you’d had a lover while you were with the Fog Warriors. But I likely shouldn’t have. As they say ‘to assume makes an Ass out of U and Me.’” His words are slurred, but even more, he would have to be drunk to laugh at a joke that tortured and lame.

Fenris doesn’t seem quite as badly off. His legs are for the most part steady, but sway in their stride now and then. The drinking seems to have affected his mood more than anything else; maybe it’s just from being somewhat alone again, but he seems quietly oblivious when the mage slips into song and tolerant enough of his stumbling to catch him for a wobble or two. He distantly wonders how they get home, regardless of the miracle of how they didn’t get attacked for whatever they had left.  
They’d be attacking the wrong man anyway, since Fenris is the one with any decent amount of coin at his hip.  
He steps past Anders as they finally head in, half turning back as he does towards the comment with raised eyebrows. As lame as it ends a smirk and soft chuckle escapes his lips, though moreso at how drunk the other man is. “I was fond of them, but I didn’t.”

“Then before me and before Isabela it was really just…” Anders hesitates. He snaps his fingers over the wick of the nearest oil lamp to light it, and sees the hint of a smile on his lover’s lips, and for a moment everything pauses. He smiles back, dazzled with what he sees and the feelings that rise up in him. "I’m sorry, making assumptions again. But… I want to ask you about that time… when you…“ Anders shakes his head. For most people being drunk is disinhibiting, but for some reason it makes any kind of explicit talk harder for him. When he’s sober he can make it sound polished to a wicked edge. When he’s drunk, it only sounds clumsy and crude. "Oh, fuck it,” he mutters and presses his mouth to Fenris’s lips.

The elf makes a surprised sound between them, his arms shooting out to catch the nearest wall and Anders’ shoulders to keep them both steady. As his mouth opens to welcome the kiss he pointedly breathes in the trapped air, hot and humid and deeply alcoholic enough that he nearly chokes. But it’s an addictive sort of suffering caught in his lungs as he presses forward, first just his tongue and lips before his back arches and hips follow suit. A very overt, purposeful show of his appreciation before he parts away and his arm drops to catch the last two fingers on Anders’ hand to drag him onward towards the bedroom. The idea of them still standing when they could be concentrating less on simply keeping upright seems ridiculous. Sadly there’s nothing closer than the bed. For once, Fenris could use a couch.  
“What in blazes are you trying to say.”

Anders closes his hand only loosely around Fenris’s fingers, making it clear that the elf can hold or break the contact at his choosing, and he follows eagerly, almost stumbling over his own feet. There’s a echo on his skin of the feeling of Fenris’s lean body arching up against him and it makes him even warmer than the alcohol still in his blood. "Who the hell taught you to suck cock? What did Danarius do to you, how did you feel, how do you feel about it now, did he hurt you, did he force himself on you, were you willing only because you had no concept of refusal, was there anything you liked enough to crave again or can I help you bury every second under a thousand kisses and caresses and erase him from your skin? I want to know your history… and I’d even be willing to let you know my own, though it’s nothing I’m proud of.“

Fenris slows as they reach the top of the stairs, eyes narrowing from their already half-lidded gaze and deep seated irritation finally welling up. It’s too many topics at once that he wasn’t ready for so bluntly, and against his worse judgement he doesn’t simply release his grip for the mage to topple all the way back down the stairs and sleep on the floor. Instead he just grumbles, the sound completely incomprehensible, and shuts it all down before it overloads his mind so he can just focus on dragging them past the bedroom door. "Yes, /yes/..” It’s vague, but it sounds like he’s ready to go into detail as long as Anders is willing to take it more one at a time from the top. While he waits for the mage to assumingly try again he lets go to start peeling himself out of his metal and clothes, the lot of it abandoned a bit more haphazardly than usual.

“I… well…” Anders stammers, weaving a bit where he stands as he sheds his coat onto the floor. He tries to step out of his boots, catching the toe of one under the heel of the other and pulling, but only gets his foot half of the way out before he stumbles and half falls, catching himself against a wall and yelping. Rather than right himself, he slides all the way to the floor and pulls his boots off, one by one, and then his pants and his breeches all in one go. He stands up again, eyes on Fenris as he lifts his tunic and pulls it off over his head, showing himself naked and half-hard. "Did you ever have sex with him?“

Fenris fares a little better, but it’s more of a controlled fall into a sit onto the end of the bed directly after getting his leggings past his hips. He chuckles lightly at the both of them, and the fact that he hasn’t done the exact same thing for the simple fact that he’s been this drunk often enough to avoid stumbling like a complete fool, even if alone. He’s doubled over pulling his heels out of the stirrups and finally detaching himself from his pants when the question is posed, and he makes the fortunate mistake of looking up. It’s obvious what his eyes land on and he rises just enough to prop his elbow against one knee, fingers knitting into his hair, self conscious despite the intoxication. "Don’t be ridiculous, of course I did.”

When Anders’s tunic falls to the floor behind him, he sees Fenris looking him over, and he swallows. He’s very quickly more than just half-hard, and he pads over to the bed to climb up beside Fenris, eyes on the elf the entire time. "And? Did you like it? Did you hate it? Was he tender, or was he a sadist?“

Fenris’ brows knit with a bit of a start as the questions onslaught again with a more personal swing. "Does it really matter, or did you intend to compare us with it?” With that small snap he stops, takes a deep sigh to rein himself in, and lifts a leg to tuck under him as he turns to sink against the mage’s side, forehead propped against a shoulder and hand drifting to encircle and drag up against the exposed shaft. “It depended on his mood, but I was still his prized possession. He was.. careful, not to do more than I minded.”

“I just…” Anders trails off, losing all focus and continuity when Fenris touches his shaft. His dick twitches against Fenris’s fingers and Anders moans out loud, his head pressing back into the bed. There’s already precum welling at the tip of him when Fenris’s fingers skim their way there. It’s as if he’s been craving that caress all evening long, the way his breath shudders in his throat, the way his hips lift beneath his lover’s hand. His thoughts scatter completely to make room for the sensation and the craving for more. He draws an arm around Fenris’s waist and rolls them both over, propping himself above Fenris and pressing down on him with a hard, deep kiss.

Fenris groans into the kiss, lips parting and willingly forced to accept it as he’s pinned between Anders and the bed under them. With them both farther gone than they initially intended it’s as sloppy as it is passionate. The quiet, moist sounds from their feverish tongues make Fenris’ hips shift restlessly as his hardon grows, pressed up and clearly defined under his smallclothes. His hand tightens around the mage’s erection, strokes the shaft firmly until he’s satisfied with how hard it is, then perches his fingers curled over the tip, covering it with his thumb and forefinger sawing at the slit and across the top ridge.

Anders gasps and pants between their kisses, his mouth wet and hot, his tongue fiercely eager even if the kiss is more passion than skill, fueled by lust and drunkenness. His hips rise and fall, making slow thrusts into Fenris’s hand until the elf’s nimble fingers worry at his tip so relentlessly that his balls begin to tighten. He moans loud and desperate, loud enough to be briefly glad Orana isn’t in the manor tonight. He wants Fenris, all of him, everything, anything he can think to do, and it has him shaking slightly that he has to choose. “Make yourself ready, or I’m putting my tongue inside you until you beg,” he growls.

Fenris nods breathlessly as his fingers fall away from Anders’ full dick. He turns over under the mage for a better reach, one hand roughly hooking over the edge of his smallclothes to shove them down out of the way while the other stretches to haphazardly paw over the table beside the bed. A bottle gets overturned in the process, ringing loud against the stone floor as it strains but doesn’t shatter. The sound makes him flinch but by some miracle the glass sounds empty or near enough to not matter, and he pulls the small container over to wet his fingers and reach back to grind the oil along the outer edges of his ass.

Anders grabs onto Fenris’s smalls and pulls them roughly the rest of the way down his long, lithe legs. He reaches for the container as well and then pauses, reaching up instead to untie the leather thong from his hair. He loops the thong tight around the base of his hard cock and ties it off, and his erection stands out fiercely hard, the thick veins near the base of his shaft bulging and his full length swelling tight as a drum. Then he scoops up some of the lubricant, rubbing his length in slow strokes until he’s glistening and slick. He fixes his gaze on Fenris’s fingers, watching them tease at the bud of his anus.

Fenris’ movements slow as soon as he realizes where the man’s eyes have settled, immediately deciding that it’s as good as he cares as his hand pulls away. He turns a bit to prop his forearm in front of him along the mattress, turning just enough to throw a glare over his shoulder. The expression looses some strength as it falls lower, his own erection starting to drip a couple small beads of precum from anticipation. “…Get on with it.” How is it he can say one thing and yet it absolutely sounds like a demanding beg.

“Have you had a good look at what I’m going to fuck you with? Are you sure you’re ready?” There’s so much heat in Anders’s gaze, something wickedly smug and yet ravenously hungry as he watches Fenris’s eyes looking him over. He gives himself a slow stroke and tug and he walks forward on his knees. “I need you to be sure,” he hisses as he leans over Fenris’s body, lips at the point of his ear. His shaft rests, thick and heavy, along the cleft of Fenris’s ass, and Anders dips his fingers in the salve once again. He lets his chest rest on Fenris’s shoulders as he breaches the elf with two greased fingers, twisting them inside him to spread the lube. He searches out that firm gland inside him and he lets his fingers press into it. “Tell me.”

Fenris bites a small edge of the bottom of his lip, nearly choking as Anders’ fingers hit that small place inside him that leaves his dick throbbing as he grinds back shamelessly. He forces his hands down against the mattress, presses his shoulders to ass up along Anders’ body, and he turns his head as if the small touch at his ear had nipped him. “Stop teasing and fuck me, damn mage.”

“How could I ever refuse?” Anders’s voice soft as velvet, lilting and suggestive. His fingers rub at that spot before he pulls them out, scissoring them wide apart to stretch Fenris open as he does. He takes himself in hand, then, and fits his thick tip against that vulnerable pucker. His hips push forward and down, and his mouth opens to bite and tug at Fenris’s ear. You are mine, he wants to growl, but he keeps the words locked away. He feels that sudden shift from resistance to yielding as the ridge of his cock sinks past the muscular ring of Fenris’s anus, and it elicits a small sigh of startled pleasure. “So good to be inside you,” he wispers, this time with far more tenderness in his voice. He pushes further, moaning as he hilts himself inside Fenris.

Fenris gasps, lungs sucking in a deep breath of air, and the small of his back shudders along Anders’ stomach as he haltingly lets it sigh out. His expression winces into a small snarl- brow knitted tightly against the scrunched bridge of his nose, lips pulled just enough to flash his closed teeth. His head jerks with a small hiss to half turn over his shoulder, enough to be quite visible but not hard enough to pull his ear from Anders’ teeth. After a couple lingering seconds his hips pull away a few inches, then tighten a bit reflexively as he forces himself back down. “Then prove it.”

“Mmmm….” Anders watches Fenris through half-lidded eyes, his tongue tracing the rim of the elf’s pointed rear. He lets it go only for an instant, and only to establish a better grip, more of it between his teeth, in his mouth. More for his tongue to tease. Anders begins to lift his hips, his cock pulled back in a long dragging stroke from Fenris’s body until the ridge of him catches at Fenris’s anus. And them, a sudden sharp bite, a rough tug at his ear, and Anders sheaths himself in one smooth, hard thrust and starts to ride, hips slamming down on Fenris’s firm rump. The motion of each thrust is fluid, smooth, every plunge followed seamlessly with that drag and pull, and then another hard plunge. It’s the pace that’s rough, and the force of it, those hips slamming down again and again, hard enough to make the bed creak.

Any remaining air in the elf’s lungs exhale in a sharp cough, eyes tightly squeezing shut from the pain tingling down in waves from his ear, the skin burning hot within moments. Somewhere distantly, he’s thankful for being drunk enough to tolerate it. His hands ball into fists atop the mattress, digging hard into the sheet fabric under them and even the mattress surface beneath it. With the grip he leans back against the pounding, and with a moan surprised at it’s own sound as his cock starts to drip onto the sheets.

Anders sucks hard at Fenris’s ear before he lets it go, panting for breath with his cheek against the elf’s silver hair. He doesn’t change his pace, even as sweat trickles along the side of his face. For just a moment he pauses, shifting the position of his knees to wedge Fenris’s legs wider apart. And then it starts again, a roll and shift of his hips to drive his plump tip hard against that spot inside of Fenris with every stroke into his tight body. His arms wrap around Fenris, slipping between him and the bed, hugging him and holding him while their bodies jolt and rock from the force in each thrust.

 

Fenris’ head drops forward the moment his ear is safely let go, forehead lightly brushing the covers. He makes another small gasp as his stance is forced wider and the full force of their sex starts right where it left off, the action almost lost amongst the aggressive movements save a quick twitch in his shoulderblades. His hips roll forward, and his jaw drops open as he finds the best angle for Anders to work against. Once it’s found he can feel himself building up, a foggy ache still faint and deep in his stomach but spreading wickedly. He moans loudly, for once too drunk to hold back and nobody’s around anyway, and somehow manages to sputter out, “Hnn, I’m getting close…”

Anders wraps his hand around Fenris’s cock and begins to tug and stroke it in time with his thrusting. He’s panting for breath, moaning hoarsely, his body working relentlessly hard to the point where his sweat drips onto Fenris’s back. “Good,” he grunts, his hand dragging to Fenris’s tip and holding tight, thumb and fingers mimicking the skilled tease that Fenris had used on his own head to drive him so wild. His thumb and finger tease at Fenris’s slit, along it and across it, catching and spreading it slightly, pressing hard and wriggling against the slight indentation. His own balls begin to draw tight… even doing this brings his mind back to how maddeningly good it had felt, to the temptation to just let Fenris finish him with his hands.

Another, far heavier shudder rides up from the base of Fenris’ spine to the top of his neck, eliciting another groan out from the deeper hollows of his lungs. His cock throbs, heavy in it’s arousal and precum coating Anders’ fingers as he teases at it. With a final rough grind backward the ache in him surges forward, forcing his stomach and legs taught as his balls tighten and his orgasm overtakes him. His slit flinches for a split second then spills cum over Anders’ hand, the thick cream pumping in small waves to flood the mage’s grip onto the sheets, and a tight shiver hits him from the sudden overstimulation of Anders even partly blocking it.

Anders’s moves his hand from teasing Fenris’s tip to milking his shaft, his fingers working a quick, rough massage against the swollen underbelly of his cock. He chokes on a desperate gasp of his own, feeling Fenris roll and tighten around him. His thrusts become staggered and quick as his thighs and belly tense until they tremble… and then his own hard shudder follows. His head drops forward against Fenris’s back while he cries out, his seed spilling into Fenris in a hot rush, his hips bucking, stabbing downward into his lover.

Fenris rocks his hips, grinding to milk himself against Anders’ hand. As the spasms arcing over his body subside even his knees and elbows feel weak, his cock bobbing in the mage’s grip lazily as he spends himself from the mage’s own climax. He’s left a complete and utter heavily panting mess, eyes drawn closed. Finally the frenzy of their drunken lust fades to a thick haze of afterglow, and a sore ache pinches at him annoyingly as the sex and alcohol both begin to wear a little too thin to hide it. “You bit my ear..”

“Nnnnnnn…you didn’t say stop and you didn’t kill me.” When the last shudder and twitch of Anders’s climax ends, he succumbs to gravity and collapses on Fenris’s back, feeling for the moment far too comfortable and far too dazed to do anything else. His words are slurred more from sex now than from alcohol. He lifts one arm, though, and lets it waver near Fenris’s head before his hand becomes just too heavy and he has to let it drop to the bed again. “Wanna heal?” he slurs.

Fenris bats Anders’ hand away a moment after it falls, with something mumbled that sounds like ‘fuck off, mage’. Despite the weak muscles complaining to him he barely falters under the sudden complete weight of the other man on top of him, though honestly he probably doesn’t notice. He’s more interested in the tiny sparks of pain webbing from one of the only sensitive spots on his body. Eventually he sinks them both to the bed, carefully pulling away and rolling to one side of Anders before lightly cupping his ear with one hand, but snorting at the tired humor of it. “What are you, a rabid animal?”

Anders actually laughs at that, considering who’s asking, but then… Fenris has left a few marks on him, but nothing truly careless. If anything, for all his forceful passions, he’s showed refinement and restraint. He lifts his face out of the bedding, eyes large, fretful. “Please, I can heal it. I didn’t mean to hurt you.” Except… he did. He swallows, his throat dry.

Fenris’ gaze drops to level him a small but completely sober glare, an easy warning that if any healing goes on Anders likely won’t see that hand again. His head turns back to gaze at nothing in particular on the ceiling, setting on his back with his ear carefully rubbed between two fingers. “Leave it be, instead of being so quick to erase the things we do.” He lets the words trail off, as his falling eyelids catch on something he remembers. “You just what?”

“I don’t. I… when you leave marks on me I always let them stay.” Anders’s voice is soft as he replies, but then, Fenris confuses him. “Just what what? You mean… Ah. You’ve got to be some strange kind of savant to pick that thread back up exactly where it ended ten minutes after a drunken fuck.” Anders shakes his head. “I want to know what you’ve been through… so I never put you through the same…”

Fenris chuckles at that, all of it. “I appreciate the concern.” He goes silent a moment as he rolls to one side, props himself onto one elbow with his last bit of strength to kiss Anders’ throat. The energy fails him and he drops his forehead to the nearest crook of the man’s neck. “You won’t.” He sounds so sure of it, and mutters into the sweaty skin. “You haven’t even pieced together what I already gave you.”

“Then help me,” Anders murmurs. “Forgive me for being so dreadfully slow.” His arms settle around Fenris’s back, and he draws in a deep breath, letting it out just as slowly. “Great Maker… I have never been so happy as you make me…” He closes his eyes, a blissful smile on his face.


	28. Chapter 28

Anders moans and mutters in his sleep. He had drifted off with an arm draped over Fenris, but now he tosses in bed, the covers twisted around him. There’s sweat on him – new sweat, not left over from their lovemaking. It darkens his hair at the roots, while his skin seems paler, his expression drawn even as he slumbers. Another mutter, dreamy and detached… at first indistinct but then a few words become clear. “…sanguis accipitris…lamina ungui debet…” Anders thrashes. “No… no, leave me… leave… him…”

Even though Fenris has gotten somewhat used to sleeping in a bed with someone else on a consistent basis, his body no longer sending him jolts of adrenaline at every small shift and rustle, he still stirs from this much turning about. As soon as he realizes it’s just Anders part of his mind just rolls back too sleep; namely the part ready to jump out and grab his sword, and instead he props himself up onto his elbows. He watches the mage silently for a few seconds before finally raising a hand to take the man’s shoulder as he leans in closer. “Anders.”

“No…! No, please…!” Anders pulls away, pushing at Fenris weakly. His voice is pleading, terrified. But the shake is enough to make him start to wake, and his eyes flutter open. He stares into Fenris’s eyes, disoriented and barely comprehending while he struggles against the sheets he’s tangled in. “Hawke! Hawke’s in danger! They’re coming up from the deep, they’re coming for him! We have to warn him, we have to run! They’re coming for his blood!”

Fenris’ grip cements in place on Anders’ shoulder, his mind waking up to actually register what he’s going on about, not that he intends to let either of them go anywhere. “That doesn’t make sense, be still. Why were you having a nightmare about Hawke? What’s coming for him?”

 

“THEY are! The Darkspawn!” Anders tries to fight his way out of Fenris’s grip. His wide, wild eyes are gradually becoming more lucid. “I heard it, I heard it sending them for him! We’ve got to warn him! He’s in danger!” Anders’s panic finally abates enough that he realizes he’s raving. “Fenris… I did hear them. You’ve got to believe me, I know how mad I sound but it was real! They’re coming after Hawke!”

Fenris watches the mage critically a few long moments before he puffs a small sigh as Anders calms down, and relaxes his hand. “Alright, alright. But why? Hawke isn’t even a Grey Warden, there’s no reason for them to want him.” Even if he knows, had heard some vague mutterings about Wardens having nightmares, he didn’t expect it to happen out of nowhere like this and sounding quite so nonsensical. Fenris drops onto his back, still heavy from the long night. “Can we warn him tomorrow? I don’t think the darkspawn are going to storm the city.”

“I don’t know why, I just know! I just…” Anders grits his teeth and bows his head, putting his hand over his own chest. He can feel his pulse still pounding from the nightmare. “It doesn’t make any sense…I know it doesn’t… and if there were any darkspawn within a week of the city I would have felt them by now. It can’t be what I thought it was.” Anders shakes his head slowly, his hands shaking in his lap. The feeling of the dream won’t leave him. It hangs in his thoughts like a pall of greasy smoke, and the images, the sensations, play through his mind over and over. It isn’t the first time he’s had this nightmare, but it’s impossible for him to grow jaded to it. Each time is as bad as the first. He starts to untangle the sheets from around himself. trying to be surreptitious about it, he runs his hands over his own body as if …checking for something.

Fenris grumbles something as he sits up, his tone only half as irritated as it would be if this had been during the day. “What is it now?”

“Nothing,” Anders snaps. He kicks off the rest of the covers and slides out of bed. “I’m just getting some water. Go back to sleep.”

Fenris just drags himself off the mattress to follow, regret sinking into his mind that he let go of the man in the first place. “Don’t.” It’s not a plea, the word hard and sharp edged, lashing out from being ordered and the assumption that Fenris could even begin to think about sleep at this point. “This isn’t just about Hawke, is it? It wasn’t just that you heard them, so /what is it/?” He reaches out to catch Anders’ arm, regain some small amount of control on the situation, the simple concept of a mage acting erratic setting him on edge.

“The nightmares… they’re felt as much as heard. Because they’re a part of us… a part of every Warden, and we can’t deny it forever. The most horrible part is knowing that part of us… is at home there in the dark, surrounded by the corruption, the reek of it, how it feels sick and sweet and you’re helpless.” Anders rakes his fingers through his tangled hair. “They… cut my body, in the dreams, and they feed the wounds with bits of offal dripping with rot and those wounds… become hungry mouths, laughing. I can feel my own flesh twitch where they gibber and slaver and gnaw away at what they’re given and I scream… and I can feel my guts filling with rot and I can taste it my throat. I scream and they sew my lips shut, to feed the other mouths with flesh and obscene kisses and I’m the captive of my own taint and madness is like a net constricting around everything I ever thought was me. That’s… it, that’s what’s wrong. You know, death is the best thing that can happen to me. If I live to my Calling, that’s how I will end. I’ve seen the shape and form of the madness that will swallow me.”

The words bother Fenris, a quiet sort of evil that digs and needles at the back edges of his mind, in the darker spaces of inevitability where he doesn’t often want to go. It’s not the madness itself, if anything the words a bit comforting in how disconnected they are from any chance of the fact that Anders is a mage would turn on him.  
So really it just means he can add the Wardens to the people he doesn’t particularly like. How their relationship would end wasn’t exactly what the elf liked to dwell on, because almost every foreseen outcome felt unbearable. It seeds a small painful spike of panic through his stomach that he has to force out of the way, ignore it’s small screams to get out of this while he still could, if only because he’s been silent after Anders has stopped for too many seconds.  
He tries to gather himself, and upturns the palm that had reached out to initially catch Anders. “I.. want to show you something.” It feels stupid the moment the words sort of stumble out of him, but after the whole night it’s the only thing he can think of.

Anders looks down at that upturned palm, coming out of his funk enough to step closer, and turn his eyes towards Fenris with a sort of vulnerable trust in them. “What is it?” He swallows again, so much of what’s spinning in Fenris’s thoughts also reeling through his own mind.

Well no turning back from his only idea now. Fenris carefully leads them across the room to one of the windows, and reaches back to unlatch the large pane of glass and swing it out of the way. The night breeze wafts in immediately, a bit chilled once it gets past the water only to hit the solid stonework of the city. With a silent sigh to really commit himself he props his elbows on one half of the stone ledge, and really just hopes Anders will follow suit. It turns out the window has an unexpectedly good view, casting down unhindered over most of the city and even out to the small channeled port, but only if you lean out. “Do you hear anything?” And really, there’s not much. With active patrols and cleaned stone, there’s not even that many bugs around to make noise at night. Just sea air cutting through the edges of the buildings.

Anders follows, leaning into the window beside Fenris and looking out at the night. The air chills the sweat on his skin instantly, but the feeling is cleansing and even a bit comforting. There’s no wind in the Deep Roads. Anders shakes his head to Fenris after he listens for a moment. “No. Only the wind.”

Well hopefully not, if the mage could hear something the elf couldn’t it really would be time to worry. Fenris lets out a small puff of air through his nose and picks up one elbow to wrap his arm over Anders’ shoulders tightly. “Exactly. Nothing is happening.” As an afterthought he leans a little closer, and raises his free hand to point to a nearby set of equally dark and silent windows. “Hawke’s there. If anything was wrong we’d know.”

Anders nods and leans against Fenris, huddles into that half-embrace and looks out at the streets with tired eyes. “I see,” he murmurs. But he turns his head, watching Fenris’s face, studying it. thinking of that arm around his shoulders, that calm voice, and he smiles, albeit a small, sad smile. “Thank you…”

Fenris’ shoulders slump, the movement mostly felt through the hug. He glances from Anders’ eyes out to the street below, and the way that eventually leads to more steps upwards on the city. For all that Anders likely meant it he still reads it as a sort of disappointment. "It was a bad idea. I didn’t mean to simplify..“

Anders pushes his head against Fenris’s shoulder like an affectionate cat. He lifts his head to see the concern in Fenris’s eyes. "I meant, thank you for holding me. Thank you for still being here. I wish I could take that part of my soul that still belongs to me, break it off, and give it to you to keep. It would be in good hands that way.”

Fenris chuckles softly, eyes closing as he drops his head by a few inches. “Keep it. I rather the idea that you’re staying here of your own volition than your six previous opportunities.”

“Five,” Anders amends. “Six wasn’t… well, only one of them was a relationship. A couple got as far as being flings. Six was… I was starving, freezing, hunted. And I found out just how far I’d go for some coin.” Anders leans half against Fenris, half against the window ledge. he hates thinking about ‘six’ but even that is better than the nightmares. “After that I decided, if it ever came to that again I’d rather starve.”

“Mm.” Fenris shifts his position, closer and sharing their warmth a bit more if they’re going to stay by the open window like this. “Five, then.” Well… four now, at 'best’, with Karl… “My point… is that I’m glad you’re here, when you had options otherwise.” If his second relationship didn’t involve the fog warriors, there likely wasn’t much choice in either of them.

“If the world were lining up at my clinic door to beg to court me I would still be here. ” Anders rests his chin on Fenris’s shoulder to murmur against his ear. “So I’m glad that pleases you. And I’m glad that you let me stay.” He pulls away slowly, but only to head back to the bed, where it was warm and nice. He hadn’t thought he’d be able to go back to it, but Fenris makes it seem inviting again.

Fenris pulls the window closed, his skin honestly thankful for the move despite how long he could have just stayed there. Just as he’s done quite a few times in the past, initially restlessly keeping watch before it settled into a more routine spot to clear his mind. The hour hits him as he follows Anders’ lead to crawl back into bed, and with a small suppressed yawn he wraps his arms around the mage to pull them closer than their usual 'loosely together’ sleep. “I could watch you tonight, if you want..” Not that he’d likely miss another one of those dreams, but the gesture is there all the same.

“Hold me and I’m content,” Anders says, curling his body close against Fenris, giving him a gentle squeeze around the waist as he settles and shuts his eyes. He can smell Fenris’s skin, his hair, and the barely present hint of lyrium beneath. There’s a gentle welling of light in his own skin, a flicker that flows over him from head to toe and is gone. Justice is with him too. He can feel him almost like another presence settled against his back, every bit as protective as Fenris is. And as much as he tries to stave off these feelings, as much as he tries not to trust that anything so good or so desperately needed can ever be depended upon, Anders can’t help but realize he isn’t alone. He opens his eyes again with grateful tears shining in them, and all that he has to say, he says with a tender smile.

Fenris’ eyes flick over Anders’ expression, his own just as solemn as it ever was, but.. not necessarily softer but certainly quieter. While he raises a hand his elbow keeps the hug tight, if just a bit higher on the man’s shoulder, and he almost absently combs his fingers through Anders’ mess of hair to straighten it out a bit. When it looks at least a little more acceptable Fenris drops his lips to the mage’s forehead. “Don’t cry, when I need you too.”

“I’m trying not to,” Anders says, still smiling, and with an affectionate, wry sort of humor in his tone. He shuts his eyes, letting his world narrow to only warmth and Fenris’s breathing and his touch. That gentle stroke and tug of fingers through his hair makes him sigh and ease even more in Fenris’s arms. “I love you, you know.”

“I know.” Fenris’ hand drops back down, fingers trailing down Anders’ skin to finally settle in a loose cup over one hip. His lips tighten into something more resembling a kiss, presses closer against the mage’s skin before his mouth pulls away, only to plant another just a little lower between the eyes. “Sleep. We can tell Hawke tomorrow, if you still want to by morning..”


	29. Chapter 29

It’s been one of those days. A day where Hawke wanted them both to accompany him for a morning ‘errand’, which was quite conveniently an opportunity to voice anything after the long night, but it also kept Fenris from sleeping in. It wasn’t directly an issue, but his silence today had been listing off everything he was resenting since he woke up, including Varric for thinking of that game, the extra alcohol in his system, Anders joining the Wardens, even the sex if he was going to wake them up again over damn nightmares.  
…okay maybe not the last one.  
In any case by mid-afternoon reading on the 'new’ couch in the main hall is when sleep completely wins out. Not a plan he really fights against, when the sun is hitting him through the windows at this hour. He doesn’t even stir from his nap, on his back but head turned towards the back cushion to shield his eyelids, when the cat hops up to curl up by his ankles.

Anders is nearly as ready to doze off. He sits with his back propped against the front of the couch and an open book resting on his knee. It’s a warm, lazy afternoon, and after a moment, Anders realizes from the sound of Fenris’s breathing that the elf has fallen asleep. Without even thinking, he turns a bit, reaching up to lightly run his fingers through that soft hair, and stroke along the back of his ear with just the tip of his fingernail. he smiles at the memory of Fenris combing back his hair the night before, especially given a bit of distance from what had given him such a need for comfort. “You gentle soul,” he whispers fondly.

Fenris makes some small, distant mutter in his sleep. With the sofa mostly to himself instead of batting Anders’ hand away he stretches, the lazy catlike movement causing the real one to get up and jump down from the couch, and turns his head to lean into the touch. With that he resituates his limbs and seems to just fall back into a deeper sleep, silent and still again.  
At least for several long seconds. His eyes crack open, the haze of the nap fading as the sunbleached pattern and worn threads of the couch fabric come into focus. A moment later the peace is shattered as his eyes shoot wider and he sits up with a start. First his slightly panicked gaze glances around the room, his head eventually turning to aid the wild search for.. something, before he crumples his face into his palms and winces his eyes shut, knees drawing up closer as he groans. “No, /no/…”

Anders gets a few short moments to smile and think to himself that Fenris might be enjoying his touch and not merely enduring it. And then, that warm and comfortable feeling is yanked away as he watches his lover snap awake and recoil. “Fenris…” He pulls himself up onto the other half of the threadbare hand-me-down sofa, trying to get a glimpse of that covered face. Shifting closer, he puts an arm around the elf’s shoulders… cautiously, though, fearful and guilty that whatever happened, it was his touch that seemed to cause it. It was his fault. So he had better fix it. “I’m here, Fenris, don’t be afraid.”

Fenris shakes his head and doesn’t seem bothered at all this time from the touch, wholly distracted by whatever was caused by the first one. His breathing under Anders’ arm is unsteady, shallow and too fast, his lungs skipping the lower sections to just fill his chest. It makes his mouth dry and he gulps, lips softly gasping harder for air like he’s been running for miles, and his eyes just squeeze tighter as his head sinks and fingers thread into his bangs. “I remembered.. I could remember all of it, and now it’s gone again.”

“Shit…” Anders pulls himself closer, eyes widening as he even tries to fathom what that would be like. “Let me look. Maybe I can find… something. Oh Maker, love, breathe… breathe in, you’re going to pass out if you don’t get some air. Come on, shhhh, deep breath, love…you can do it.” Anders keeps his arms around Fenris, secure but not tight as he frets.

“../shut up/.” Everything Anders says is a distraction, something slowing him down as he tries to chase after the fast vanishing life he had. It’s like running after a horse, trying to catch the tattered edges of a cloth caught by the wind and only left with a few insignificant threads, keeping hold of sand with only spread fingers. The grains are left to prove it was real but it just makes the pain worse. Fenris nods, minute but feverish, breath only barely calming.

Anders quiets, but he places the palm of his hand on Fenris’s back, fingers spread. With his mind rather than his body, he pushes, as if he was preparing to heal. Pushes, seeking, his magic surging and catching up with Fenris’s racing mind. He’s there, following the same corridors of thought, the same retreating beacon. What is pulling it away so fast? What’s locking it away, what’s hampering Fenris’s pursuit? The feeling that creeps over Anders reminds him of the time he’s slipped in loose skree and ended up in a giant spider’s web, and with a gasp, he pulls his hand away. “What in flames was…”

Fenris barely hears him, breath slowing as his mind begins to accept the inevitable, leaving him staring at the frustrating dusty evidence of what just happened. The hoofprints, thread and specks of stone are nothing to the real experiences; he can remember the concepts of a wild horse, a thick blanket and a beach but nothing true behind them. Not what they looked like, felt like, smelled of, just that they were there, at one time. Only words now, completely nonsensical and without context. His knees edge closer to his chest, and his hands fall in defeat, let his arms cross over his knees so his forehead can plant there.

There’s a long pause before Anders breaks the silence. A long moment spent going over what he saw and felt, turning it over in his thoughts until he felt he could understand the structure of the magic he’d found traces of, as well as its nature. It leaves a foul taste in his mouth, one he’s come to recognize. "You were lied to.“ Anders’s voice has something cold and flinty in it. "What was done to your memories was done deliberately. That fucking magister has bloody fingerprints all over your mind.”

“I know.” But he doesn’t, not really. Not the way that Anders means it. “Why wouldn’t there be, you know what he did. The scars are right here and he did it all. It doesn’t change anything, and it didn’t then either.” Any predicted irritation in his voice is gone for now, too exhausted and reeling over the lost dreams of before to focus clearly.

“No, I mean, what he did to your memory. It’s got nothing to do with your markings, Fenris. it’s a spell. It’s blood magic. Blood magic doesn’t get into somebody’s mind by accident. Your memories were locked up and bound with a spell.” Anders shakes his head, his stomach sinking and his gorge rising all at once. "I… he violated you in the worst way, and he killed for the power to do it! Are you listening to me? Do you understand what I’m saying?“

Fenris belts out a sharp laugh, shot silent as an arm punches out and hits the back of the couch. "He killed every other day, mage. Don’t tell me these things like I’m supposed to react to them now, when I was there when they were alive to beg that I help them.” His hand drops as he glances out of the corner of his eye over his shoulder, voice lowering to a small growl. “And what difference does it make, if you could you would have tried to fix it by now.”

“No, because I’d never seen it before! You told me it was to do with the pain of being branded and … I never thought to check if it was anything more. Not since you started letting me get close.” Anders hangs his head, clearly considering this an admission of failure. “I can take those blocks away. But they were made by Blood Magic. I would need to use at least some blood, or some lyrium, to fix what was done to you.” He pauses and swallows hard. “I do not wish to use blood magic, but if you ask me, I will.”

“As far as I knew, it was.” Fenris goes silent, for too long of a time. He’s actually considering it. Even asking Anders to do it, and the oppressively huge knot balling up in his stomach to even think about it. “…how much blood?” Deep down he knows the answer will be more than he’s worth. Danarius wasn’t one to only go halfway, and he personally saw the amount of slaves the mage commonly used.

“Let me look again.” Anders holds out his hand, his magic roiling around his fingers as a blue mist. “Spells like this weaken over time. It won’t require as much to unravel it as was used to set it in place. I may be able to do it on my own.” Anders is solemn, watching the anxiety on Fenris’s face.

Fenris visibly struggles, gaze shifting between carefully watching Anders and his eyes going uneasy and a hint repulsed when they drop to his hand. Might as well be pushing a viper towards him and saying to trust it. He wants to, tells himself he wants nothing more than Danarius dead and to have his memories back, but even when the solution for one of those is staring him in the face he shifts backward a few inches. The small hostility in his eyes flick up, the only warning he’s going to give. “Don’t.”

Anders only nods and draws back his hand. The choice belongs to Fenris. He can’t even conceive of how disorienting it would be to have his memories returned, and he isn’t in any hurry to finally cross the line into Blood Magic. And yet he knows that for Fenris, for this, he would do it. Score one for the mage-hating elf… every mage -does- apparently have a point where they’ll turn. Anders folds his hands in his lap, looking down at the floor. “If you ever change your mind, my offer stands.”

With Anders’ magic fading Fenris turns his head away, eyes falling to nothing in particular. The amount of frustration he feels is oppressively heavy, his mind aching as it races, wondering and trying to pick up hints as to whether Danarius knew or not. Knew that Fenris would feel such an aversion to having magic, much less blood magic, that there was no danger of him regaining his memories. And he wants to pace, and scream about, but it all rolls into a single mass of inaction. Underneath the weight of it all he smirks, painfully. “I thought something like this would change how I felt.”

“It’s a reasonable thing to think,” Anders answers softly. He props one foot up on the edge of the couch and rests his arms on his thighs, watching and listening. “You want your feelings to change?”

“About him? /Of course I do/!“ Fenris snaps back, his shoulders flinching at his own energy. His voice barely cools, still just as agitated but with a bit less direction. "It would certainly make things easier, wouldn’t it. You know what he’s done. I can hate him all I want and it doesn’t change anything.”

Anders shakes his head. “Are you saying you don’t want to hate him? Or you want to hate him more? Honestly it’s hard for me to tell.” For all Fenris’s fury, Anders still seems more worried and sympathetic than hurt by any of his words.

Fenris calms, if slowly, though it’s less peaceful and more a quiet misery. “You know what I feel.” Or at least can intuit that this would be simpler if the elf just plain hated the man. Fenris raises a hand, shoves it through his hair. “…maybe I need to be alone for a while.” Whether or not it’ll do him any good, he has no idea.

Anders looks perplexed, but the expression shades towards worried disapproval. He shakes his head. “I don’t see how that would help.” He takes a breath as if to say something further, but he holds it back instead. Regardless of what’s right for Fenris, Anders finds himself afraid of having to leave his side right now, so soon after one of the nightmares. Fenris is the only thing that makes him feel able to face his life, just now. “I would rather not go… I just don’t know what to offer you right now that you would want.”

Fenris is silent again for longer seconds than is humane in this situation. It’s not that he doesn’t want Anders, more of he doesn’t know how he actually feels about Danarius. All this time later and he can’t do anything but avoid the subject, leaving it an untreated deep wound. “Alright.” His forehead just falls deeper against his palm. “If you’re going to stay, then..be here with me.”

Anders shifts close to Fenris on the couch, putting his arms around him once again and leaning against the elf’s lean and solid body. He does what he can to try and gather Fenris into his embrace, to give him his shoulder to rest his head upon. “By your side is still the best place in all Thedas to be.”

It takes time but with nowhere to run to and just focusing on dealing with the wreckage in his mind, Fenris begins to uncoil from his ball on the couch: first just his muscles loosening from themselves, then relaxing under Anders grip, and eventually after a period of their silence he begins to lean back into the touch, breathing slowing and calm. His head raises a little as his hand reaches to wearily massage his brow. “…I need a drink.”

 

“I’ll join you.” Anders makes no move to get off the couch, however. Fenris’s state of mind notwithstanding, he’s feeling remarkably content. There’s a fire in the hearth and a beautiful elf wrapped up in his arms, and this battered old couch is actually quite soft and comfortable.

Even Fenris lingers a bit longer after the statement, but he does get up, carefully untangling himself from their limbs and uncurling his legs to set them on the floor. Once he straightens he stretches, nothing really overt beyond his muscles systematically flexing and releasing for a moment. He nearly leaves for the kitchen regardless of Anders, but pauses and glances back, the silent question in his somewhat exhausted eyes. Coming?

No, he always walks like this.  
Anders rises from the couch after Fenris does, the lack of a beautiful elf in his arms shattering the alchemy that had kept him immobilized. When Fenris stretches, his gaze wanders all along that lithe body as his tongue slides along the inner surface of his lips He also stretches, pushing his fingers through loose blonde hair, and he follows, barefoot, to the kitchen. “You know, if fucking me would make you feel better, I’d be perfectly willing… Just… wanted to make sure you knew.”

Fenris picks up a ready bottle of wine in the kitchen and uncorks it, tipping it back to take a swig as he falls into a seat by the table. The bottle comes back down with a heavy thunk onto the wood, placed a tad far from himself and pointedly in Anders’ direction, his hand loosening from the glass. His small smile at the man’s comment is tad forced, but at least he’s putting forth the effort. “Has that ever not been on offer, or am I horribly mistaken?”

“Never. You pretty much had me ‘festis bei,” love.“ Anders answers that wan smile with a wide grin, sitting across from Fenris and taking the bottle in hand. he takes as deep a drink as he dares, noticing that the wine gets a bit harsh after it’s been left on the table overnight. But it’s still good, and plenty alcoholic.

"Only then?” Fenris snaps the bottle back the moment Anders sets it down for another drink, this time more before he sets it back down again, needing to survive the drought when the mage takes the wine. Normally he wouldn’t be this clingy to a bottle but this time it takes some will to not just drink it down like a parched man in the desert. At least he’s beginning to feel the heat of it hit his gut on the second swallow. “I was such a fool…” The way he says it is almost like he’s talking about some normal past ex regret, instead of the entirety of horrors encompassing Danarius. But it’s.. easier, compartmentalizing it.

Anders gets the idea that Fenris is awfully serious about getting expediently drunk, so he swallows briskly and passes the bottle back. “Tell me about it? I almost suspect that you might have just been trying to make the best of a bad situation… foolish or not.”

Fenris cracks a smirk at that, a breath of air escaping his lips as they part with it, and he lets the bottle in hand idle on the table while he glances down to his distorted reflection in it’s dark surface. “Hardly. I wanted to be with him. At the time I only hated his experiments because he pushed me away when he thought I could still be persuaded away from him.”

“What did you like about him?” Anders tells himself there’s got to be more to the infamous Magister than just the heartless villain he tended to picture him as. And yet, he isn’t sure he likes that idea, or wants to see him as a man and not a monster. Not now, not when the man’s memory is his rival in romance.

Fenris pauses, then shakes his head. “I don’t think I dwelled on those details, not like I do now. It was.. simple. Aside from Hadriana’s torments he, his and where we went were the only constants I paid any heed to…” Another drink at that, heavy enough that the wine films on his tongue and burns on it’s way down. ”-and he was the only one allowed to touch me. “  
The elf’s eyes shoot up as that unexpectedly rolls off his lips, self conscious and expecting some sort of reaction from Anders, but they drift just as easily as he just continues, “Hadriana broke that more times than I could count, and he caught her at it, but it only further convinced me at the time that it was everyone else that was cruel. Looking back…. he called me his most prized possession, but I didn’t notice the difference between that and anything else. He was.. appreciative, and that was enough.” His eyes narrow, and he quickly adds, “Not just the way you think.”

Anders doesn’t look upset; mainly pensive. He props an elbow on the table, leaning with his chin in his hand while his eyes turn distant. "I… think I understand. It must feel good to be wanted. To have a place and a purpose… a little bit like what the Qunari go on about. Being praised, favored, knowing exactly what is expected of you.“ Anders lips quirk wryly and he gives voice to a small, sad chuckle. "I can even imagine that I’d miss it, in your place.” His expression becomes wistful for a moment, but he hides that look away under carefully composed neutrality. "You didn’t flinch away from his touch as you do from other mages?“

The elf simply tips his head to one side, stopping a second headshake as his words arrive before he has to think on them too deeply. "I do because of it. As much as he said no one else was to touch me, I defended his words even when he had to hire healers for me. He would always leave when they strapped me down… probably reminded him of his own experiments.” Fenris growls a low mutter in Tevinter over that, a frustrated sound that he could say such things so almost wistfully, even as the magister haunts him. His next words come in a snarl, “Every time I’m either reminded of them, or him.”

Anders lowers his eyes to the table, biting down on the inner surface of his lip but failing to keep from frowning. Jealousy rises like bile in his throat. There’s an element of shame, as well. He shouldn’t want Fenris that way, he shouldn’t have this impulse to keep him close and call him “mine”. And yet the impulse is there. It’s not so fierce, not is he so selfish, that he’d act on it. He doesn’t even want to give voice to it. “Was he ever kind to you? Not just as a reward but just… kind?”

Fenris shoves the bottle in Anders’ direction, momentarily feeling the mage might need it more than he does, and crosses his arms under him along the table. “Is there some redemption in him you’re looking for? Yes, he was kind, the 'rewards’ were constant and not for any specific action. But he was also fond of me while slaughtering slaves for blood magic, and that I’d stand by as he bled them like beasts.”

“No,” Anders answers with a bitter laugh. He takes the bottle and drinks, one deep swallow after another before he slams the bottle back down and wipes his mouth with the back of his wrist. “You’ve decided you want him dead. I’ve no doubt he deserves it, too. But mostly…I detest that he had things with you I never will. I detest that he had you at all. Flames take him, right or wrong.”

“With any luck age will take him and I’ll no longer be plagued by the poor fools he hires.” Fenris grumbles, head dropping to glance down to the table’s well worn surface. As much as he can want the man dead, it’s not going to happen by his hand when he’s safely ensconced in Tevinter. Even if he wasn’t, the elf sincerely doubts his luck would go that far. But he looks back up with renewed determination. “You will. Not today, but I want to.”

That convicted determination still comes as a surprise to Anders, and the small scowl on his face eases away. He manages a small, hopeful smile. “I need to stop thinking about all the things I’ll do for you when it’s right. It’s going to be the second best night of my life.” He sighs and shakes his head. “But that’s a digression, and… age? He’s that old?”

Fenris waves a hand, and reaches for the bottle to get a swallow down before answering. “It’s a bit early yet, but I doubt anything else will ever find him. I hardly had to protect him.” But his eyes narrow, faintly. “Second best?”

Anders thinks about saying it outright, but then he hesitates. He leans back in his chair and smiles. "Guess.“

Fenris knits his brow as he takes another small, absent gulp of wine before setting the bottle back down. "You’re not going to say our first night together. Please tell me you have more taste than that.”

Anders grins. “No, not that night. Excellent as parts of it were, there was a great deal of unpleasantness up front. Guess again.” Anders takes the bottle and drinks once more, passing it back to Fenris.

Fenris pauses to think again. “When you decided it would be easier with the oil you keep, then.” He sighs heavily as he picks up the offered bottle. “Just tell me, so I can groan and move on.” With a quick tip back he takes a swig from the wine, quick about it before Anders can reply and make him choke on it.

Anders rolls his eyes. "Right night, wrong reason.“ He feels his cheeks turn pink when he realizes he’ll have to spell it out, and he reaches for the wine the moment it’s set down, draining the last of the bottle. ” 'Ardor meum, amor meum, vita mea.’ As long as I live I’ll never forget that.“ Embarrassed and blushing furiously, he looks away.

Oh is that all. Fenris closes his eyes while he can’t help but silently chuckle through his nose, a smile crossing his lips. His gaze opens again soon enough, basking in that blush when it’s not coming from his face, for once. "It’s still true. I can’t believe you doubted it before that.”

“It isn’t so much that I doubted it…” Anders mumbles, just audible. “It’s that if I believed it and you told me I’d jumped to conclusions, I would have been crushed.” He still can’t manage eye-contact, and the blush seems to be going nowhere.

“As if I’d go through these things for anyone. You haven’t been easy.” Fenris shoves the empty bottle out of the way roughly enough that it wobbles and nearly topples over, and reaches past the table to catch a fistful of the front of Anders clothes. Though, a bit gentler this time than he’s been in the past. “I’m not leaving if you haven’t chased me away by now.”

That lunge startles Anders as it always has. He never quite gets used to how fast Fenris can move. He lifts his head, still blushing, but this time he lunges across the table to offer the kiss Fenris seems ready to seize. He’s almost breathless. Warmth comes off his face like an aura, and his lips are hot and wet.

Fenris leans his weight forward to press back into the kiss, and presses up onto his toes to get just a few more inches closer across the table, his free hand propping against the tabletop between them to keep himself from toppling over. But just as easily as he dragged Anders forward he uses his grip to gently push him back, just enough to break the kiss. “Damn mage, when will you realize I want this as much as you do.”

Anders has his eyes fixed on Fenris. His look is intense, his hands clenched at his side so hard his nails bite into his palms. His magic flares into eddying mist around him, but with a deep and deliberate breath, he stills it again, controls it. “I am beginning to understand,” he says, voice rough and tightly controlled. “When are you going to realize that is the greatest gift anyone has ever given me?”

 

Fenris has a few silent words about the table between them, about then. The tight grip on Anders’ clothing lets go, and props down against the table like his other hand. With little effort he he shifts his weight and vaults his knees onto the table, and slinks forward until there’s a folded leg on either side of Anders’ waist. Once he settles he leans into another smaller kiss, and reaches forward to catch both of the mage’s hands to carefully lift them up and place them along his hips. Even under clothes his muscles tighten from the touch, but don’t otherwise protest.

Anders opens his hands when Fenris takes them, and he lets them rest where Fenris places them with only the gentlest pressure. He leans against Fenris, warm breath stirring his silver hair, skimming the surface of his ear. He’s trembling with the force of what he keeps restrained… magic, passion, a joy so profound that it aches. With eyes closed he lets his lips caress the upper edge of Fenris’s ear, a slow, satin glide from base to tip. His teeth close on the tip with barely any pressure at all – just enough to hold – and then release, followed with a flick of his tongue.

Fenris drops his head to Anders’ shoulder, careful not to pull his ear too far out of the way in the process, and pulls those hands higher to the gentle inward curves of his waist. Even with him guiding the motion the dragging touch sets a small fire along his skin, the tension gathering and coiling in his muscles until they ache. Only when it comes to a stop does he begin to remotely relax again to an idle flex, and he sighs sharply in his frustration.

Anders utters a soft and soothing “shhhhh,” letting go of Fenris’s ear for a moment to kiss his lips. He lets Fenris be the one to guide his touch, and he leaves his hands in place. Even if Fenris is frustrated and uncomfortable, they’ve discussed this. It needs to be done. And Fenris’s waist is so supple and slim between his hands. Anders’s lips close on Fenris’s lower lip and softly tug before he lets go, caressing Fenris’s ears again with his lips and tongue, with the tips of his teeth and the stubble on his chin.

As he’s lightly distracted at the small attentions from Anders’ mouth the muscles along the elf’s flanks gradually begin to loosen. It’s not at all completely 'better’, still left on edge and flinching, but touching him is no longer like caressing a clothed statue. Fenris unhooks his hands from the mage’s, his palms hovering a moment while he debates whether he can stand giving this freedom,and pulls his head back up while he raises his arms to prop them in a loose hug across Ander’s shoulders. The hug tightens, pulling their bodies more flush against one another, his breathing uneasy between them.

“I could never hurt you,” Anders whispers. "You are my whole world, Fenris. You are light, and life, and love to me. I could never hurt you.“ Carefully, gently, he moves his hands along Fenris’s waist to his back, palms resting low on his shoulderblades as he embraces the elf. He kisses his temple, the corner of his jaw, and then his pointed ear again. The cartilage is thin, flexible, finely-formed to the point of being delicate. For some reason those ears make Anders think of an afternoon he’d been sat down for a long, serious talk by the First Enchanter, who had given him a cup of hot tea in a bone china cup so fine that he could see the light of the room faintly through its walls, and he had been quietly amazed that the fragile thing didn’t break at a touch. Fenris’s ears were that fine, that perfect, even artisanal. Anders laughs inwardly, that he’s seeing the fingerprints of the Maker on his lover’s pointed ears. But truly, Fenris was some of His best work.

Fenris gulps and nods quietly, and while it helps his nerves his muscles are another matter. This is better than their attempts thusfar, but it still gnaws at him. A part of him still feels like he belongs to someone else, clearly, if his own lover can’t touch him. It threatens to drive him mad, just sitting here and not being able to do anything to fight it save trying not to flinch away.  
Anders’ lips run across a small inconsistency, hardly noticeable just looking at the elf’s ear without knowing it’s there. A small ridge of a scar that healed a bit oddly without treatment, drawing a thin line from the back of his ear to the upper edge.

"You have a scar here,” Anders murmurs, his lips resting against the upper rim of Fenris’s ear. His arms give Fenris a tight squeeze, holding him protectively, posessively close. "I never noticed it before.“

The comment immediately causes Fenris to momentarily forget what they’re trying to do, and he casts a quizzical look at nothing in particular. He leans back as he removes an arm from Anders’ shoulder, pointedly making sure his movements aren’t enough to break the mage’s touch, and he raises a couple fingers to rub at the back of his ear to summon the memory. If there even is one he remembers. His eyes flick up, then back to Anders when he finds it. "Tevinter soldiers had caught up with me. One with a personal grudge also happened to be good with a bow.” Thankfully not good enough, the arrow missed it’s mark by a few inches.

“He’s dead now I assume.” Anders looks immediately concerned at the thought of Fenris very nearly taking an arrow through the brainpan. "What was the grudge over?“

Fenris smirks a little at that, the muscles along his back finally softening as he forgets the mage’s hands are there, the humor laced with a snarl. "I’d thought he was the first time, when my sword cut through his neck to the spine. The problem when everyone is a mage is that they have a bad habit of not staying dead for long.”

“Ah, it’s one of our many foibles,” Anders murmurs. "Sorry not all of us seem to properly appreciate the value of beautiful, courageous elven men in skin-tight leather armor. You got all the way through him the second time, I hope.“ Grisly as the topic is, Anders kisses Fenris on the forehead, just above his eyebrows.

Fenris closes his eyes at it, at first a peaceful little flinch, and he can’t help but crack a small smile as Anders’ stubble scratches at his nose. He scrunches, the twist in his face pulling with a small frown. It’s all he can do to keep from sneezing. "I did, but with my luck he’ll find a way to come back.” Doubtful though. There’s a small darkness in his tone, recalling how he’d gone back after killing all of the soldiers, and digging at the man’s neck in the rain and mud with sharp stabs down until it was nothing more than an unfixable, crunchy pulp of a mess.

Anders pulls back to lean forehead-to-forehead with Fenris. His arms are still wrapped around the elf, his palms spread on his back "If he comes after you again, we’ll just have to cut him into more, smaller pieces. And then possibly light those pieces on fire.“ Anders doesn’t sound especially serious about the idea, but then, looking into Fenris’s eyes from this close, his thoughts are on other things. "You have the most beautiful eyes I have ever seen…”

With a small puff of a silent chuckle Fenris probably smiles at that idea far more than he should, but he freezes at the compliment. Isabela had told him that too, so there must be something to it, and all the same his eyes flick down, partly obscured by his lids. “Sometimes I think you /want/ to embarrass me.”


	30. Chapter 30

Anders is sleeping late, and as has become usual, Ser Mewins is curled up between the top of his head and the swell of the pillow beneath him, a tabby-colored crown on his haystack of bed-tousled blonde hair. He was up late, devoting another long night to his “nonsense”. There are still ink stains on his fingers to prove it. But there had been more on his mind than the Cause, the previous night. What he had had to pour out to the page, he had brought upstairs with him and left folded and stuck under the front cover of the book on the bedstand, Fenris’s current reading selection.

Fenris manages to wake up before Anders, for once. The light through the nearest window hits his eyes and he sleepily recoils to rolling over, but it doesn’t help. He’s already in that annoying flux of too awake to go back to sleep, but too sleepy to get up. The mage in bed with him feels like some tether, and with a quick sniff to make sure Orana isn’t making breakfast he decides to shove himself out of the way of the sun and reach for his book, making a loose grab for the spine. The page Anders left there slips out and flaps a bit in it’s shuffling land to the floor, and he sets the reading back down as he leans forward out of the bed to fetch the paper.

 

To my beloved Fenris,  
You don’t have to read this. I’ll warn you right here that this entire thing likely boils down to “stating the obvious” as you often put it. But even so I’ve found I need to write this. Much of what I have to say I’ve said before, but it still needs to be said. It’s still true. Writing like this helps me organize my thoughts and put things into words that otherwise would come tumbling out over one another, jumbled and stammering. I have so much to say about how I feel for you.  
I love you. I have loved before or I thought I did, but never like this. You may accuse me of putting you upon a pedestal, of seeing only what love would have me see, but that isn’t entirely true. I admire so much about you. But I know your flaws as well, and I love you for them. I love the whole of who you are. If I praise you overmuch it is because I find you to be far more aware of your faults than your virtues.   
I wish you could see yourself through my eyes. I wish you could feel what I feel for you – touch this love directly instead of having to piece together some idea of it through my poor inadequate scrawlings. I find it so strange that someone as graceful as you are could be so ill at ease with his own body. I have never seen beauty like yours. When I look at you, sometimes, what I feel is oddly far removed from lust. I am astounded, maybe awed is the right word. I find myself dazzled dazed weak in the knees jawdropped Or maybe dumbstruck is the right word, given how hard it is to describe. There’s an ache, certainly. Not in the loins and not a desirous ache. It’s more fulfilled than full of craving. Because just being able to look upon you is like a blessing beyond anything I could have asked for.  
For all that, it wasn’t your beauty that made me need you the way I do. Not your beauty alone or even foremost. I saw your pain and wanted to heal it. I saw your loneliness and wanted to reach out to you. I saw so much in you that I had felt myself, but all of it brought about by such different circumstances, in such a different person. You did not deserve such suffering, you do not. And yet you suffered, alone, lost, wounded and angry, and I felt it like an itch I couldn’t scratch. I wanted to help you but I could not, and that was what made having you near me almost unbearable for all those years. I still feel such satisfaction when I see you smile, now, or hear that small laugh in your throat. Your pain has always been my pain. And now your joy is my joy.  
And now you have told me that you want this as much as I do. I believe you. I want this so much that I tremble with it and that I weep like a broken besotted fool even right now, writing these words. When I imagine that kind of feeling directed at me, I am in awe, and I am wrapped in bliss I can’t even describe. I have lived my life as a pariah, alone and unwanted. I have never been loved as you love me. I cannot even debate whether I deserve it or not. Deserving is so far beside the point. I am grateful either way. I am blessed. I have had no place in the world, no home, no refuge. Now I have a place in your heart, your arms, your bed. I never expected you to be the one to heal me.  
Yours Always,  
Anders.

 

Somewhere in the middle of it Fenris’ hand had found his temple, propping his forehead against the pillars of a few fingers. As he finishes it he sits there silently save a small gulp, staring at the words without reading them a second time. He’s not sure if he’d be able to if he tried. Unlike the mage he can’t even begin to articulate how he feels so ill at ease about the entire mansion, but wants to be with the man enough that he just bears the brunt now with little complaint. Anders and Orana’s constant presence make it easier, clear and less like the Tevinter mansions he was used to.  
Without further lingering he folds the letter closed again in one hand and turns, getting up to his knees in the process and straddles Anders’ hips, settles along his body comfortably and leans in to press their lips together in a simple kiss. A part of him feels odd, this content and for once not in the slightest thinking about their multitude of problems. For this one, small moment, he just wants to be together with a damn mage. Fate deals with a terrible sense of humor.

A soft, content murmur, and Anders opens his eyes partway. His body still has the listless feeling of not having totally woken up, and Fenris is a warm, comfortable weight on him. "Good morning,“ Anders murmurs before he returns the kiss. At their stirring, Mewins stretches, mindful of his claws and Anders’ scalp for a change, and with a friendly chirrup, hops off the bed and trots away to find his breakfast.

Fenris watches the cat go out of the corner of one eye, and crosses his arms over the warm spot of pillow above Anders’ head. "Did you /honestly/ spend last night drawing my scars with roses on them on this paper?”

Anders sighs. "Only an hour or so. I know I’m hopeless, you don’t have to inform me. I just… had a lot on my mind.“

"I see.” Fenris dips his head, props the bridge of his nose against Anders’ chest. “I wish that I had a suitable response for you. Something more adequate than, ‘it’s complicated’ or 'I want you to touch me’, they’re both true but don’t encompass the entirety of it.”

Anders blinks and begins to blush. "You mean… you read it? You… didn’t hate it?“ He looks down at the crown of Fenris’s head.

Fenris furrows his brow against Anders’ skin, his lips idly pressing to the mage’s chest and the thin layer of hair there. There’s a small grumble in his response, but for the most part too tired and a bit enamored to be hostile. "Was I not supposed to?”

Anders pulls his arms out from under the blankets and wraps them around Fenris. "That’s not what I meant,“ he murmurs. He kisses the spot on Fenris’s scalp where his silver hair is a whirl. "All I wanted was for you to know my feelings and… hopefully, to be pleased by it. You don’t owe me any other reply.”

Fenris raises his head at that abruptly, and pulls his arms down to cross them over Anders’ chest and prop himself up to regard the man, eyes momentarily critical. “Does this tell you enough, then?” That he woke up Anders for this even when he doesn’t have the words he wants to say, that he’s settled in this position he wouldn’t normally be caught dead in, and enough that the mage’s hug barely caused any reaction along his skin.

Anders takes a moment to think about that, his blushing cheeks turning pinker, but his eyes darkening with extreme satisfaction. His hug tightens into a loving squeeze. "Yes. Please stay?“

"Alright.” As he says Fenris makes no move whatsoever to get up, though his eyes trail down the longer he lingers. He doesn’t have to outright fidget, just that small shift, the tip of his chin a bit downward is enough to say something is bothering him and making him self conscious under Anders’ close gaze. “I suppose.. I should thank you.”

Anders is sublimely content, only shifting to answer all of Fenris’s fidgets with small snuggles. "What for?“

"For managing to embarrass me even if nobody else will read it.” Fenris quirks a tiny smirk at that, but the look fades too fast as he thinks about it further. “I’m not sure if it’s all true or just madness, but it makes no difference. You meant them, and no one else has said them.” And he pauses at that, then reluctantly adds, “Danarius never did. we both acted under the impression that he created me and knew his own skill. I didn’t realize how much it would mean to me.”

“You’re welcome, Fenris.” Anders answers in a soft voice. "I don’t believe in any Maker, but sometimes, looking at you, I do wonder. And then when I realize that you, with that beautiful body and gorgeous face and kind soul… that you care for me… that you’re sharing your life with me… I start to feel like I have very little in life to complain about.“ Anders laughs a bit wryly at that. "So, yes. Madness or truth, those are my feelings.”

It’s Fenris’ turn to blush, deep and red at this unfamiliar brand of blatant, verbal, detailed attention. With Anders’ laugh he leans in to kiss the mage again, his movements slow and deliberate as he opens his mouth and they taste each other.

 

He only breaks it to plant a s few smaller kisses along the bottom edge of Anders’ mouth, sucking at the vulnerable skin between his own lips, and pressed between them his dick stirs gently, not completely committed but interested nonetheless.

A warm, sweet sigh brushes Fenris’s lips when that first, lingering kiss finally ends. Anders feels the warm, velvety brush of Fenris’s dick against his thigh, and his own sex stirs in response. "I’m going to need to write you another one,“ he murmurs. "All that and I didn’t even get to what you do to me in bed…”

Fenris huffs loudly, jerks to turn his head away at that, as if he could hide so far after the fact how hot his cheeks feel. “Please, /don’t/. One was hard enough.” He doesn’t sound too particularly irritated, just that he’d simply die of embarrassment before getting through any more of it. Much less if anyone else found these. “Just… tell me, if you have to.”

“You really are the best I’ve ever had.” Anders rolls to his side, making it a bit easier to utterly engulf Fenris in a hug, even draping a leg over his hip. "And you’d best give in and believe it, or I’ll write a five page persuasive essay on how you hit every sweet spot I’ve got as if you’ve got me mapped out in your head.“ He kisses Fenris’s temple, feeling the heat of his blush even up to the edges of his hairline. "How you’re strong enough to dominate me completely, and slim and tight enough to make me feel as big as Hawke when I’m on top…”

Fenris winces his eyes shut with his lopsided grin, and makes a weak attempt to drop his forehead to the bed. Even if he was shot in the back right this instant, he’s too swept up in the jumbled pile of comfortable limbs they’ve made. It’s.. a good distraction, if nothing else. Let them come. He’s becoming tired of running, and in the meantime he can just… forget, if for a moment. “I’m relatively sure you’re /bigger/ than Hawke, but you would have to ask Isabela.”

“I’d meant in– You really think so?” Anders finds himself blushing again, and he nuzzles in against the crook of Fenris’s neck, letting that heat be felt. "You gorgeous flatterer.“ His shaft is hard against Fenris’s hip. ”..Oh, and I would be remiss if I didn’t mention that thing you do with your thumb when you’re stroking my dick. The thing that makes my toes curl and makes me want to be your pet forever if you’d just promise to keep touching me like that. Or the way you hold me pinned when you fuck me so even my bones know I belong to you.“ His words are a low and gentle thrum against Fenris’s ear.

Fenris practically chokes, only half turns his head from the mattress he’s pressed against to reply. "It’s not exactly a talent.” But if it’s that simple to make the mage happy, he reaches down to blindly search out the erection pressing against him. His fingers cuff firmly around the tip, the upper flared edge held snug between his fore and middlefinger, and presses his thumb into the small dip below the slit. His remaining fingers give the shaft a squeeze into his palm to emphasize his point. “You might have to speak to someone if you don’t think you’re ‘gifted’ at this point.”

Another hot puff of air from Anders’s mouth, and it’s the mage’s turn to try and hide his face against the pillow. His dick is fully hard in the elf’s hand, and true to his word, his toes curl against the back of Fenris’s calf. "Fenris…!“ Anders’s voice carries such a pleading, pleasured whine as he tries to stifle it in the pillow, finally gasping and biting it as his hips grind forward into Fenris’s palm. That touch, firm and direct, edges on being too much when it begins, but by the time Fenris’s thumb goes still, it’s become not enough, not nearly enough, and precum wells and drips from his slit as if his cock is drooling for more.

Fenris sighs and shakes his head a little, leans forward to be the one pressing his lips into the crook of Anders’ neck while he squirms. "You’re hopeless. What have you done, until now?” Almost absently he rolls his thumb forward until the pad hits the metal of the mage’s piercing, and he rocks it forward to slide the metal into the slit.

“Given … a good deal more than I’ve received,” Anders answers breathlessly. His eyes roll shut as Fenris toys with his ring. "And if this is nothing to you… I’m wondering what you think I should be impressed by?“

Fenris goes quiet a moment in thought. "Anything I can’t easily do with my hand.” With that he drops his fingers, the grip still strong as they fall down the shaft, pause at the base then pull at his skin as they drag back up, only to repeat the motion a bit faster. “I had this impression that you were more experienced at this than I was.”

“I don’t know. I’ve fooled around, but the novelty of a new partner is different from the novelty of a new trick… and all the really fun things are 'second date’ territory. I haven’t had many second dates.” Anders looks up at Fenris with the one eye that isn’t obscured by his pillow while his hips roll against that stroking hand. "You really are good at this, though. But if you’d rather… I can tell you about how perfectly you suck dick. It’s a skill I was proud of until you utterly schooled me at it…“

Fenris glances down at that, and after a few more strokes his hand perches at the head as before, props his thumb along the piercing slicked by precum and rocks it back and forth feverishly. He sighs softly, and offers his best explanation. "Senate meetings were long…”

“Andraste’s tits that’s kinky…” Anders barely manages to spit the words out before he’s panting and moaning again, hands gripping and twisting in the sheets behind Fenris while he squirms. His cheeks flush deeply and his eye glazes over with pleasure. He can’t help but imagine Fenris under some Magister’s robes, sucking, teasing with his lips and tongue for hours on end. And then he imagines himself in the Minrathous forum, an enclosed desk hiding everything while he had Fenris between his knees, pleasing him expertly, keeping him close and just waiting for a squeeze on the shoulder to tell him to finish him. "…going to come…“ Anders moans sharply and buries his face in the pillow entirely, his body taut and his pleasure so near its peak.

"I’m just glad you didn’t make me wait..” Fenris’ breathing grows heavy as his own erection swells and grinds against the bed, and he simply does his best to ignore it. He’s done well either ignoring it outright or dealing with it later, in the past, when his attention didn’t always get returned immediately. He sucks at Anders’ neck as his other hand reaches down, and grips the shaft to work over it’s length, enclosing it tightly while he keeps rolling the ring in a quick pistoning into the slit. That one motion keeps rocking in place as his fingers change position, his thumb switching for his middle finger as his palm cups over the head.

Anders moans something unintelligible into his pillow, but while his words are muffled, the urgency in his voice comes through clearly. His thigh is trembling where it rests over Fenris’s hip, and his hips move in short jerks, just barely pumping into Fenris’s agile hands. For a moment he reflects on how much at Fenris’s mercy he feels when he’s so close to his climax, and how being brought there by such deliberate touching and teasing accentuates it. He is in fenris’s hands, both literally and figuratively, manipulated sweetly, played like an instrument and finally about to sing. It takes deliberate effort for him to turn his head from the pillow, to look up, wide-eyed and defenseless, into Fenris’s face. "Fenris,“ he gasps. "I–” He locks gazes with Fenris’s emerald eyes for just a moment before his eyes loose focus and his gaze turns distant and fathomless. His cry is silenced in his throat as his seed begins to pulse out into Fenris’s hands. And finally his body shudders hard, his eyes rolling back and showing white for an instant before they shut.

Fenris’ eyes flick up at the mage’s words. Without thinking he lightly touches his lips to Anders’. He wouldn’t even really consider it a kiss, his mouth parted and plenty of air between them, more that he wants to feel the man’s shivering breaths in warm gasps along his own skin. The quick motions on Anders’ cock slow; his thumb presses down along the ring, gently opening the spasming slit wider as his palm slows and grinds it’s heel along the bottom throat of the shaft. As the mage’s firmly milked orgasm subsides the ring slowly grinds into the slit again, prolonging the climax as far as Fenris can coax it.

Anders’s breathing is all shaking gasps and barely restrained moans His lips move once or twice, struggling to frame words but failing, and Fenris’s touch coaxes the cream from Anders’s cock until his shaft and the elf’s hands are fairly coated with it. As Fenris’s fingers tease the ring against Anders’s slit, a few more heavy, aching throbs of pleasure shake the mage. And then, abruptly, enough becomes too much, his gasps turn to loud groans, his short bucks into desperate writhing. "…Please stop, PLEASE, oh fuck, oh MAKER please, please stop…!“ Yet his hands grip into the sheets and pull and twist, rather than even attempt to push Fenris’s hands away.

Fenris stops immediately as pleaded, but doesn’t completely let go or let up on his pressure. All Anders gets is a tiny amount of stillness to recover, just enough to wait for that overstimulated pain to pass, before he slowly grinds forward again. The ring is still pressed firmly down, stretching the slit and sliding the ring along the inside, the gold covered and slick from a glazing of jizz. Even the elf gasps a little, leaning his own swelled erection against the mattress as he breathes a response into Anders’ mouth. "Not yet. Keep going.”

“SHIT!” Anders manages not to thrash, but he still squirms, his hips pressing down into the bed but he’s unable to pull any further away from Fenris’s grip and his teasing, coaxing fingers. "Oh, Maker, PLEASE!“ There’s a sob in his voice, and he’s moaning out loud without a hope of stifling his cries. "Please, please, I can’t…” He trails off into a loud groan and he realizes that his hips are starting to roll and thrust against Fenris’s hands, and his quivering body growing taut all over again. Just as suddenly, too much is almost enough. "Please don’t, please don’t, oh please don’t stop I’m going to COME!“ Anders screams. His body arches off the bed, shoulders pressing back into the mattress while he wails, feet sliding against the sheets as he writhes and squirms and bucks against Fenris’s hand. There’s only a small surge of seed, but his body seems to work twice as hard to expel it, and the spasms wrack Anders until he aches.

Fenris can’t help but crack a small smirk, the edges of his open and heavily panting mouth pulling a little at the corners, as Anders’ pleas change their tone when he tumbles over the edge towards the next orgasm. When it hits he does stop this time, grip still tight on the twitching erection but unmoving, and as the throbbing subsides a second time he simply loosens into a more cradling hold with his palm still a complete mess. The elf dips his head a little lower, draws a few light kisses along the front of Anders’ neck. "I’ve never done that before."A small fact he’s honestly proud of, something he can call distinctly theirs.

Another hoarse whimper of "Oh, Maker” and Anders’s body finally eases into a near-collapse. Something tickles at Anders’s temple and he rubs at it, surprised to find the traces of involuntary tears. "Neither have I,“ he manages after a few minutes of trying to catch his breath. There’s still a dull throb in his groin as his cock grows soft in Fenris’s hand, a twinge of aching at his core from the intensity of what he’d been made to feel. "No one’s ever done that to me before, I mean… or… made me beg like that…” Anders looks up into Fenris’s eyes with his gaze hazy and smoldering. "I need a moment… and I’ll give you absolutely anything you ask, I swear it.“

Fenris chuckles a little breathlessly just from watching at that. "And if I don’t ask for anything?” With a careful swipe from his grip to drag most of the cum with his hand he lets go and rolls out onto his back, his own erection thick and straining hard against his smallclothes, the smallest wet dot darkening where the tip is pressed. He reaches with his cleaner hand for the small hand towel on the bed table; he learned pretty quickly what needs to be on that table at all times, and at least two clean hand towels is on that list. “I think Orana went to the early market, otherwise she would have come running in thinking I’d finally grown tired of you.”

“Then feel free to demand or take as you please, but I -will- give you yours, Fenris.” Anders has fiery determination in his voice, and he finally manages to find and gather some strength to shift his body and prop himself up on one elbow. And as if on cue, there’s a little shuffle of feet outside the door, probably not even audible to Anders, and very light footsteps retreating down the steps. Orana manages not to giggle until the kitchen door shuts behind her, but when she does it’s nearly a girlish shriek of laughter.

Fenris is in the middle of towelling his hand off when he jumps at the sound, freezing a couple long moments before he connects the sound with what he just says. With a sigh releasing his tension he drops back heavily to the bed, and nearly mutters a curse. Instead, and only when he’s sure she’s well enough away, he grumbles. “It’s hard enough, sharing this space with you…” ..and nearly impossible to share it with more than one other person when the elf jumps at every last sound, a dose of adrenaline injecting into him each time.

“Speaking of 'hard’,” Anders says, kicking the last tangled bits of sheet and blanket off the bed as he rolls onto his belly and props himself above Fenris. "This seems like a fine opportunity for me to get some practice in.“ Scooting further down, Anders drags his lips over the bulge in Fenris’s smallclothes, letting his hot breath tickle through the weave of the cloth. His tongue flickers over that dark, damp spot for a taste of Fenris’s arousal.

Fenris doesn’t make any outright sound but his hips set in motion from that small touch, a tiny flex from his legs to bring that tip closer to Anders’ lips, even when his cock is still covered. With a quick shove he props himself up onto his elbows, his expression already a bit half-lidded.It doesn’t stop him, though. "It usually helps when you take the clothes off before you start.” Just a thought.

Anders casually flips Fenris the bird while he goes on tracing the outline of his hardon with firm, flushed lips. "If you don’t want to watch me kissing you through your smalls, you could always start sleeping in the nude.“ That retort given, Anders hooks his thumbs under Fenris’s tight smallclothes and starts to tug them down over his hips.

"Right, and when the slavers come by they’ll know what to aim for first.” Fenris angles his hips to help slip his meager clothing out of the way. His erection, thick with reined lust, strains against the cloth until it slips past the head. It bobs in the open air, the slit moistened from the precum that had rubbed against it. More forms in it’s place unhindered, flooding the small opening then rounding before growing too heavy and dripping down along the shaft.

“If you were under the impression that your smalls, or your actual pants, make it somehow difficult to determine where your dick is, I’m afraid you are sadly mistaken.” Anders drags his tongue across his lips, though, as Fenris’s hardon bobs free. "And that’s not a complaint,“ he hastily amends. He pushes those thin breeches further down, just far enough that they’ll restrain Fenris’s legs a bit, and then he lowers his head again to brush his lips over the warm, supple skin of Fenris’s scrotum.

"Better than calling attention to it..” Fenris stops and just lets go of a small sigh, whatever air had been left in his lungs escaping as his lips part. He does make a small motion to try spreading his legs a bit farther, his hips shifting as his thighs press against the easy confine of his smalls, but he gives up easily to it. If he had to pick favorite moments it would be ones like now: the sight of how utterly /willing/ the mage looks, Fenris’ cock lightly leaning against golden hair, and just before the delicious haze of sex completely clouds his mind.

The expression on Anders’s face is not only willing but worshipful. His eyes are partly lidded his flushed pink lips wet and parted as his tongue traces over the swell of one of Fenris’s balls. It’s tricky, letting it fall into his open mouth so he can massage his tongue over and around it, but with a bit of extra care, Anders manages without using his hands. His mouth is warm, and his saliva cool on that velvety, tender skin. When his lips are closed, his tongue swirls over smooth, loose skin. And when his mouth opens again, that skin tightens and firms up as his breath skims across it.

The breaths that follow that sigh grow heavier, more ragged with soft shudders as he exhales. Whatever he had on his mind, even the small talk before it, is completely forgotten under the attention Anders is giving him. A small whisper of a groan carries on his sighs. His cock twitches as it tries to grow yet harder, straining against itself, veins becoming more prominent along the shaft, and the underside nuzzles Anders’ forehead with the lusting movement.

Anders finally lifts his head and drags slack lips along the underside of Fenris’s long, thick shaft. "You have the most beautiful dick I’ve ever laid eyes on,“ he murmurs, voice hoarse and husky, lips moving against Fenris’s cock with every sultry word. "Long and thick and smooth and perfect. And when I look at it I know so well what it’s capable of doing to me.. plunging in smooth and hard and stretching me open and taking me, making me scream…” Anders brings his lips and his warm breath to Fenris’s plump tip. His tongue darts out to catch another taste of precum, to give a teasing swipe to the slick and flushing flesh where his lover is most sensitive. "You are so fucking perfect…“

Fenris’ mouth drops as he stares, slowly going dry and parched, and a few moments later he snaps his lips shut with a gulp that ripples under the cage of scars along his throat. Whether it’s Anders’ actions or his words the elf’s cock flexes to wet the tip further, enough that the quick taste leaves a thin, glistening string of precum between them. It weighs heavy and bows until it snaps, and leaves a trail down the satiny shaft. Fenris closes his eyes at that, to take a moment to control his breathing and purposely grumble. "Stop waxing poetic, mage.”

“Yes, Ser,” Anders answers playfully. His tongue races over the narrow groove below Fenris’s slit to catch another drip of precum, and then Anders fills his mouth with that thick and blushing tip. He works with his eyes shut, his focus given over to the motions of his tongue. He sucks just hard enough for it to be felt while the tip of his tongue traces widening circles over Fenris’s tip.

Fenris winces, fighting shutting his eyes outright for several long moments as he watches Anders’ face before they finally flutter closed. It’s then when he can really feel every curl and flick of that hot tongue amongst the wet pressure. The seal of the mage’s lips in a ring planted just behind the gently outward curving ridge both excites and frustrates him; the edges of his cockhead pressing against the pillow of lips when he turns his hips just so, tingling and inescapable in a way that makes him throb, but also speaking of a shallowness when he just wants more of himself buried into that waiting mouth.

Anders feels the tension in Fenris’s hips, the minute movements he makes in pursuit of his own pleasure, and he subdues the urge to smile while he goes on sucking. He lets his lips slip past the ridge of Fenris’s tip, then pulls them back over it to confine his sucking kiss to just the uppermost dome of Fenris’s cockhead. He repeats the tease again and again, never taking any more length, his writhing tongue never wandering past the supple bit of skin just beneath the head.

Even closed Fenris’ eyes scrunch tighter, and his lips draw apart though his teeth are clenched closed hard enough to flex defined muscle along his jaw. With the horrible teasing that threatens to send him over the edge then and there he outright moans, the sound loud and unchecked as he arches his hips upward. Blindly he reaches forward, catching Anders’ shoulder and digging his fingers against it desperately, as his balls tighten and strain to hug closer to his shaft.

Anders finally gives in and lowers his head on Fenris. bringing his tip to the back of his throat. Swallowing would be awkward at this angle so he simply keeps him there a moment while his tongue works at the tender underbelly of Fenris’s thick shaft. He bobs his head, slowly, the tip of his tongue working in firm, steady swirls along as much of Fenris’s length as he can engulf.

Fenris bucks his hips upward, though the movement is half-cocked and none too strong, an instinctual jerk he couldn’t fight down. His eyes open again to catch sight of Anders’ lips dragging along his shaft, the length of it burying and filling the man’s mouth, propping his jaw wider to hold him. His cock is burning hot, veins full and pulsing when restrained down by Anders’ mouth and tongue, and with surprising speed the movements overwhelm him. Fenris lets another moan escape him as his stomach and loins tighten then burst with their release, and his cock spasms as the slit at the tip flexes wider to spill thick cum into the mage’s mouth.

“Mmmmm!” The noise that thrums in Anders’s mouth is startled and appreciative and all to clearly reminiscent of the sound of being pleasantly surprised by something utterly delicious. His tongue firms and rubs hard and steady along Fenris’s shaft, massaging that pulsing channel as best he can without using his hands. He lets Fenris’s cream flood his mouth until he can feel it coating his tongue. A thin drizzle of white escaping from the corner of his mouth, Anders swallows thickly, raises his head to gasp for air, and then lowers again, cleaning Fenris’s cock with lavish swipes of his tongue.

Fenris’ thighs go taught as he rides out his orgasm, his heels digging into the bed in their attempt to push his erection higher, deeper into the tight space that’s coaxing his throbbing, thick cock into milking itself for Anders. His jaw drops as he reaches forward, lungs heaving with short gasps for air, his fingers lightly curling along the man’s jawline as his thumb wipes the very edge of the climax dripping past Anders’ lips.

Anders quickly shifts foward on the bed, crawling over Fenris’s bucking form to lean down and kiss him, mouth still glazed with warm, fresh jizm. He covers Fenris’s gasping mouth and thrusts his tongue in deeply, making sure that Fenris tastes himself in the kiss. He lowers his body down, letting his weight give Fenris’s rolling spasms some gentle resistance.

Fenris goans into the unexpected kiss, almost shy at first but his tongue beginning to probe forward as he gets used to the edged saltiness of Anders’ freshly used mouth. He lets them both drop the rest of the way back onto the mattress, raises his arms to clutch the mage into a tight hug, his hips grinding against the welcome body laid over him. Eventually, reluctantly, he pulls his head back to catch his breath, and takes the moment to to look up "Amor meus amplior quam verba est.“ With a small puff of a chuckle amidst the other ragged gasps, he adds, "What are you turning me into..”

Anders looks down into Fenris’s eyes with a fresh blush on his cheeks from those words. He smiles, though, and sweetly – looking as if he’s bewildered to be this happy. “That’s right, make the mage your scapegoat,” he teases, resting his head alongside Fenris’s neck. 

Fenris pulls up one of his knees and grinds the topside of his thigh along Anders’ spent dick. He tips his head to one side, propping his temple against Anders’ hair and he stares at the ceiling. “Scapegoat? This is all your fault, mage.”

“Mmmm, very well. Maybe I did do it.”


	31. Chapter 31

(ed note: aaaw shit you guys, it’s finally Danarius time. I am terrified and excited to do this nonsense justice)

Fenris had been abrupt, to say the least, to tell Anders that he’d not only heard from his sister almost immediately after writing her but that she was coming to the city. Then to add that they were going to meet her, now, at The Hanged Man.  
It was too fast to make a big deal of it, and that’s exactly how Fenris wanted it. At worst, Varric and Isabela would notice them. At best it would only be him with Anders in tow, and only that much because anything to do with his past had a tendency to set him on edge. He had so many doubts, that there would just be slavers waiting for him, that he had to shove it out of his mind forcibly. It was part of why he hadn’t mentioned anything, so he wouldn’t have to dwell on it long.  
It’s only when he’s opening the heavy set wooden door to The Hanged Man that it hits Fenris just exactly how he doesn’t know what she looks like at all. Even with the midday low crowd, he suddenly feels a fool for how this hadn’t occurred to him.  
But somehow he does, a small spark of light in the back of his mind as he spots her brilliantly red hair first, strands of it catching the light like fire even in the haze of the tavern. He manages to cast a glance towards Anders, any lingering doubts leaving his mind, before he approaches her. He doesn’t even have to ask if it’s her. “Varania.”

Anders has recognized that Fenris is racing ahead with this meeting, but while one he might have thought it was from eagerness, he thinks he recognizes the frenzied rush as the haste of a man with the wolves of doubt snapping at his heels. So quick, so sudden, so convenient. Anders thinks he likes this even less than Fenris does, but Hawke hadn’t been home when he’d tried to recruit his assistance. Fenris won’t be alone for this, however it turns out, and whatever his misgivings, Anders feels reasonably confident they can dispatch any slavers if this is a trap. He stays at Fenris’s left elbow as they enter the inn, and while he probably should be checking the crowd for Varric and Isabela, he cranes his neck and follows Fenris’s gaze instead, caught up in an unexpected swell of hope that his sister -will- be there.  
And there she is.  
Varania recognizes Fenris with scarcely a glance, and that glance is all she gives him. She turns away, lowers her head, eyes fixed on the peeling red paint of the table in front of her. “It really is you.” Asside from an apparent note of despair, there’s a dry huskiness to her voice, and her eyes are large, dark emerald green, and indescribably sad. She is Fenris’s sister without a doubt, even if her hair is auburn and her skin a shade fairer than his.

Fenris stops at her gaze even with how short it is, freezes for a moment as if he’s been slapped, only regaining himself as she looks down. Everything about her is so vivid, not only now but as it connects with long forgotten pieces of him. And yet, this time, it isn’t upsetting. Not the hard shock he’d gotten with Anders, but a forceful clarity, and he’s hit with a wave of realization that he misses her so much, even when he’d forgotten she existed. His brows raise, pained as pleasant as the nostalgia might be. “I remember you.” He doesn’t even know if the words mean so much to her, but he’s too overwhelmed by that simple fact. And then adds, should he forget it a moment later, to firmly commit to his mind. “We played in our master’s courtyard while mother worked. You called me…” The name hits him as it nearly stumbles out, and he chokes. His name. Something so simple, so immediately intimate and foreign to his mind that it leaves him disoriented.

“Leto.”  
Varania pushes back from the table and rises to her feet, graceful and proper. Her movements seem, in a way, to echo Orana’s, shoulders square and her hands at her sides. The only thing that doesn’t fit is the way she turns away, even more. “That’s your name.” She missed him. She remembers what was done to him and it burns even clearer in her mind because it will happen again. She wishes she could take those words back. It’s no mercy, to show him that kindness, when he won’t be allowed to keep it. But at least this moment will be buried, too, along with all the others. The joy that tugs at the edges of her heart can stay where it is, outside, at the fringes, shut away. Because she is going to lose him again, and she will never have her brother back.  
Anders can just about taste the guilt on her. – the shame and the hurt and the way she stands so stiffly, the way she looks away. His eyes dart about the room, his hand hovering at Fenris’s shoulder, and then dropping to tug at his belt. This isn’t just what he thought… this is worse.

Fenris doesn’t immediately notice. He’s too absolutely blinded to his own feelings to notice her shifting. It’s only when she looks away, giving Anders’ presence a chance to catch his notice, the mage on end, that he really noticed something amiss. The elf looks back at his sister with new eyes then, as the realization settles. “What’s wrong? Why are you so-” But the sentence trails off as he’s unable to place her actions, exactly. She’s grown since his memories, subtle mannerisms lost between them.

“Fenris, it’s … run, just run.” Anders can’t bring himself to say it, not when he knows those words, that truth, will break Fenris’s heart. Not when he knows those words will probably end his sister’s life and make Fenris a fratricide. It’s these words that make Varania turn towards them at last, her eyes pleading for Fenris to listen, praying for there to be something, an accident, a sliver of a chance for him to go.

Fenris takes a half step back, the movement itself small but his muscles silently coiling and ready to bolt. It’s too little, as a figure comes around the corner from the top of the stairs to make himself known, armored Tevinter guards at his side. His body constricts on itself, a sickening mix of adrenaline and a small edge of terror that sweeps him and threatens to leave him in a cold sweat. For a split second he can’t even move, eyes pinned as they grow wider, the whites of his eyes too easily visible.  
“Ah, my little Fenris.” The man didn’t have to say a word; even without Fenris’ reaction, it’s so clear who this man is. His clothes aren’t extravagantly detailed but are so spotless and perfectly tailored, everything set in perfect order, his movements as he strides down the stairs with an overwhelming air of confidence even here where he so clearly doesn’t belong. The soldiers that follow behind him are stiff in comparison, armor just as pristine and quietly rich.

Anders feels his blood run cold. This situation goes instantly from bad to worse, but with the trap baited with Varania… with Fenris’s reaction such a sure thing .. who else could it be. Anders bristles with fury to the point where the remaining feathers on his coat almost fluff up indignantly, but then he takes in the sight of the Magister’s face… the apparent scrawniness of the arms under that robe, the hint of a paunch above his belt, the crags around his eyes and mouth, the steel grey beard and thinning hair combed back to try and hide the bare scalp beneath… and he ends up looking utterly incredulous. “Wait a minute. Wait a minute. This old codger used to bone you?”  
Varania immediately hides her face with one palm.

Danarius’ eyes slide away from Fenris’ body towards Anders, his gaze somehow oily, a faint hint of a smile cornering his lips as he sizes the other mage up. What a spirited little thing.  
The small freedom unlocks Fenris from his panic enough to slam his fist to the table, the movement itself a bit weak as he cracks his joints back into action, and pours all of his pain into his glare towards Varania. “Why?! You led him here!”  
The chuckle that precedes the Magister’s words is low, and just as fond as it is amused. “Now don’t blame your sister, my pet. She did as any good Imperial citizen should.” Danarius comes to a stop in front of them, hardly even bothering to keep any sort of distance. He doesn’t even believe he has to, and he’s hardly looked away from Anders beyond casting a glance to his little wolf one more time. “And this is your new master, then? /How charming./” Somehow he manages to make that sound genuine and dripping with sarcasm at the same time. “You miss me so much that you needed to find a new mage to take you?”

“I’m sorry it came to this, Leto.” Varania lowers her head, the despair in her eyes as sincere as words seem to be.  
But Anders is furious. Too enraged to recognize he’s probably being baited, and with a disgusted scowl he inserts himself between Fenris and Danarius. “What?! Really?! We’re both mages and you’re going to harp on that? Maybe he wanted a change, maybe he wanted somebody who could get his dick hard without sacrificing a baby goat, you dusty, ancient fart! I’m not his master, and he’s never to my knowledge sat up in bed pining away for that old man smell or asked if maybe possibly I could make my joints creak a little more when we’re fucking. You pathetic, horrible toad, so desperate for a lay that you took advantage of someone you stripped of the ability to refuse you! You callous, sadistic, slave-mongering, bloodletting lecher! If you have any idea what’s good for you you’ll get your bony geriatric arse back to Minrathous and forget about ever laying a finger on Fenris again!”

Danarius narrows his eyes, Anders coming a little too close in the way that he might blow some dirt onto the Magister with his vitriol. He can practically smell the filth on the other man, and it makes his nose twitch upward. but his tone doesn’t crack for an instant. “My, and I was going to invite you along as a reward for taking such care of him. I’m afraid you’ve got a bit much of a mouth on you though.” Well. Anders certainly has a mouth, but the words that come out of it would prove far too much back home. Even with training, there’s just nothing to do for outbursts like that, and he tsks. “A shame. But did he not mention his affection for me? How little you know my chattering dove, he was far from unwilling. I remember it quite fondly.”  
Fenris, for his part, has gone completely silent. A part of him could run. Right now, just run, and don’t look back until he’s too far away. But it would leave Anders, alone and abandoned. And as much as it tears him to shreds inside to stay this close to what he’s been running from for years, he can’t go.

“You took pieces of his mind away from him! I saw what you did! He was no more willing than a Tranquil obeying a Templar! You know bloody well what you did in order to make him tame for you! It’s an outrage! How DARE you try to veil it behind your smooth words!” Anders is beyond angry, he’s livid. Cracks of radiant blue stand out on his skin, barely encroaching upon his face. “He was violated! His heart and his soul and his body! You will atone for what you have done to him! He will not go back to slavery!” It’s then that Anders realizes how carried away he is, how far his passion and rage have gone as Fenris has fallen silent beside him. He turns to him in a moment of doubt. “..will you?”

“Atone?” Danarius stifles a laugh to a mere chuckle. “You know so little of the situation, and yet so quick to judge it.”  
Fenris only barely reacts, his eyes flicking towards Anders with a small snarl. “You think I want to go back?”  
Danarius takes a slow, deep breath, growing weary of this tedium. “Regardless, you will.” He turns his gaze back to the mage that’s all too close. “If he was so ungrateful, why do you think he went for /you/? Albeit how… lowly, bedding another mage sounds so predictable, don’t you agree? Or were you interested in compensation for your trouble.” Either way, Danarius catches Fenris’ eyes before the elf can make a run for it. “Come here, Fenris. Now.”

Anders gives Fenris a stricken look, Danarius’s words spoken with so much confidence they put doubt in him. “Don’t go,” he says breathlessly. He isn’t sure he can even allow it. The fissures of blue creep along his face until one of his eyes is subsumed by the glow. “Tell me he doesn’t know your heart.”

Fenris doesn’t answer, looking between them for far too long, but settles pointedly on Anders. “Don’t. I need you, here.”  
Danarius is growing impatient, the tone in his voice slowly edging firmer, more dangerous and hinting at his titles in Tevinter that were not easily taken. “Enough, I can’t take the drama. Do you really wish to throw your life away, or will I take it for-”  
“Shut your mouth, Danarius!” The words surprise even Fenris but he’s swept up in it too far to stop now, heels digging against the floor as his body flashes and ignites at his unexpected rage.  
“That’s /Master/.” Danarius growls, the sound deep and threatening, though he backs up several steps and lets his guards storm forward.

“HYYEEAAAAAAAAAAARHHHHHH!” Anders bellows with fury, taking his staff from his shoulders and swinging it in a wide arc, the slavers before them going rigid with a layer of pure white frost upon their armor and their skin. The blue glow in his skin seems to have discharged itself into the aura of tempestuous magic that flares around him… magic that touches Fenris and sinks beneath the skin, lending him vigor and speed beyond even what his lyrium can give.

Danarius falls back, retreating towards the stairs as a shield pulls up and shimmers into place to form a protective bubble around him. Fenris shivers uneasily at the magic rooting it’s way into his muscles, a faintly cold touch deep along his bones, but he swats his feelings about it aside because more importantly, the magister might be getting away. Every last inch of him secretly hoped and feared Danarius would personally come for him one of these days, and now that it’s come his intent has steeled to wanting the man dead, and nothing less. And now that he’s come to the decision, his master is trying to escape it.  
The elf launches forward, sword swinging in a wide arc as he pulls it from the sling on his back, only to be blocked as more guards come swarming down the steps and demons dragging themselves up from the floor at their backs. It’s those monsters that launch the tavern into chaos, crowds of people toppling chairs and stools as they make for the door. Several of them stay, likely assuming the best demon is a dead demon no matter the reason, but half of them are too drunk to truly know what they’re doing. One flails a weapon forward, sloppily, and with a quick but lazy return of a claw he chokes and stumbles, skin drawing wide from the split in his stomach and intestines spilling as he falls. Several others fall this way, but Fenris barely registers it save another wet and heavy sound amongst everything else. The soldiers seem hellbent on rushing him, clearly having instructions to focus on taking him above all else, but with his new speed and the feeling that his sword is now ten times lighter, he makes short work of them.  
The problem with the heavy armor the guards are wearing is that his sword can’t slice through it, but it doesn’t matter. With each swing his sword comes into blunt contact with armor plating, the metal screaming out and casting small sparks from the force as the protection just dents sharply inwards against the person inside. It slows his work, makes it tedious, but in the end he can’t help but snarl a grin as he phases and continues forward. At one point he thinks he sees bolts fly past him, close but not aiming for his head, and it would have been unsettling if he wasn’t lost to his rage, explosive as he takes out everything onto the guards. Slowly he begins to make a path forward, blood spraying across his front and hissing immediately against his glowing form, and he doesn’t even confirm each body he passes is dead because he’s /not going fast enough/.

Shades. Their appearance doesn’t surprise Anders in the least, but they certainly aggravate him. Shades have become so passe’. Everybody’s been using them. Can’t these blood mages ever summon anything fun? Trying not to roll his eyes too much, Anders turns and swings his staff, launching an arced volley of spirit bolts into some of the prowling demons. He feels as much as hears something come whizzing by his head, and when he turns, he’s able to step out of the way of a collapsing slaver with a crossbow bolt protruding from his shoulderblades. He’d been too focused on Fenris the entire time to notice Varric lurking in the corner booth. And with that being the case, Anders hopes that Isabela is around somewhere as well.

The shades fall back to the ground one by one, leaving a dark viscous residue that mixes with the blood of those caught in the crossfire. The oil deepens it’s color, then blazes brighter, cracks as a rage demon rises in their wake.  
Fenris feels the demon as it’s summoned, it’s heat emanating to wash over the room and across the bare space down his spine. But he could hear the previous demons fall, and he assumes this one will be the same. The only thing he notices is the fact that the amount of silver and red cloaked armor coming towards him are beginning to dwindle.  
His sword hits another guard full force, the edge denting armor halfway inward on the soldier’s chest and leaving him crumpled against the floor, choking as he dies. A small shower of bolts whisk past him, cutting a clear path through the remaining numbers, and Fenris practically shoves past them as he rushes up the stairs. Danarius’ shield is still up, but it’s going to falter eventually.

The blast-furnace heat of the rage demon is immediately answered with a freezing gale of wind, stirred by another swing of Anders’s staff. The mage is casting about him, felling foes with whatever power is handy, but always keeping an eye on Fenris, always ready to cut short any cantrip to give him aid. What he doesn’t see, at the top of the stairs, are the two rogues wearing naught but their smallclothes and leaning on either side of the corridor wall at the top of the stairs, daggers at the ready. They watch Danarius and his shield with expressions of utter boredom.  
“So this is the famous Danarius?” Garrett Hawke jerks a thumb towards the mage in the glowing orb.  
“So I gather. And rather apropos, don’t you think, that Arcanum gives us the phrase ‘coitus interruptus’ just for times such as these?” Isabela fidgets with the strap of a deep blue satin brassiere which seems set on sliding down her shoulder. Both rogues have tousled hair and telltale flushed cheeks.  
Garrett groans in annoyance. “That fucking magical orb he’s hiding in? My balls are that color -right now-.”  
“If only they glowed, now that would be something.”  
“Hmm!” Garrett tugs his beard at the thought. “Do Fenris’s?”

The orb loses power but Danarius hardly falters for it. Instead of falling back a second time, even with Fenris barrelling up the stairs, he strides forward just as confident as if the elf was no more than a child with a cardboard sword. It works, his stern glare as he raises his free hand enough to make Fenris hesitate, and he unleashes a ball of fire down the stairs. It’s small but not for the lack of force tightly packed inside it, and Fenris practically stumbles to one side to pull his body out of the way. He remembers those, knows exactly what they do. The ball hits the floor behind him, chewing a deep blackened hole out of the floor before dying.  
With the direction of them turned around Danarius smiles, the expression thin and wide on his lips. A new volley shoots forward as he backs Fenris down the stairs and then steps off of them himself, but this time the ex slave is ready. With the magic induced speed he sways out of the way, raising his sword as another launches his way, the ball glancing off the thick blade and soaring high across the room until it hits the far wall with a small boom. And he takes a step closer. Years of standing at his master’s side, knowing exactly how he fought to be of best use now benefits him. He swings forward, the move too early and impatient to do any damage before Danarius pulls back. For it a ball glances the bare skin of his arm, boiling and hissing as it melts a wound into him then passes.

Anders manages to lunge out of the way of Danarius’s second fireball, and he watches it sear another blackened hole into the floor. He should probably be impressed – his own fireballs are generally conjured to injure, but these would maim or kill outright. Rather than put any fear in Anders, though, this outrages him further. The casual and uncaring escalation of the violence, and even more, that Danarius is throwing these things at -Fenris-. The wave of stench from burning flesh hits Anders a moment later and he realizes whose it must be as he watches Fenris stagger in his assault. He hollers in fury, words failing him, his staff sweeping forward and then twirling down, a blast of aching cold followed with a stone fist hurtling through the air towards Danarius’s face.

Fenris chokes, swept with a wave of nausea, though less from the impact of screeching pain on his arm obliterating his nerves and more from the smell of it. The stink of his arm frying, Danarius looking over him, it’s too close to the memory branding his mind from so many years ago. He’d be dead from his faltering then, surely, if Anders hadn’t distracted the magister into raising his arm, a flash of a shield forming to take the brunt of the magical impact. When it crumbles the protections fades and Danarius swipes his hand through the air, the movement followed by his staff, and a sheet of melting fire sweeps high over Fenris’ head to attack the other mage.  
And that’s what tears him from his past, able to shove through the nausea and lurch forward again, closer before taking another swing. It takes the man off guard and he raises his staff for another shield, but it’s too a split moment late. The edge of Fenris’ sword connects and shatters the field before it can form properly, and continues until it cracks against Danarius’ staff. The sound is loud as the wood splits, splinters of it flying out as a shockwave emanates from it to release the energy it had pent up. Though Fenris barely wavers from it the small blast and suddenly prone to the sword in front of him Danarius stumbles and falls backwards.  
Fenris follows, sword swinging out of the way between them as he reaches down to haul Danarius into the air, the small thump from his palm as it hits and tenses against skin, acting before he can think on it. The man coughs in his grip, suddenly gasping for air and looking weaker than he had moments before. Instead of stopping him it only enrages the elf further in the moment, makes him snarl, that this is what has kept him for so long even after his escape. “You are no longer my master!”  
The rage pent up in his grip pops, the sound filling the tavern, as he tries to phase Danarius’ neck in his hands. Instead the man’s throat explodes, the blood spilling from him just the tip of the damage as everything under his skin obliterates, and the elf tosses his body back before turning towards Varania.

Varania cowers into the corner, her hands half-raised before her, her green eyes wide and solemn and stricken. Her brother’s intensity is familiar to her, but the bitter scowl on his face is not. "I had no choice, Leto,“ she says to him with a shake of her head.  
Anders steps up cautiously behind Fenris, just within the reach of his arm. The shield he’s quickly manifested to deflect Danarius’s final blast of fire dissolves away into the air, and Anders is mouthing a healing cantrip, wisps of smokey blue streaming from the gradually healing burn on Fenris’s arm. The others move in as well, Varric stepping over the corpse of a slaver, and Isabela and Hawke stepping down the stairs, Hawke’s arm around his pirate lady’s waist.

 

Fenris stops short instead of just killing her outright, distantly unsure of his own movements but hesitating from her indistinct familiarity. Faint memories with her are dancing in his head, only barely there like a sense of deja vu, that he’d only seen her in a dream once, long ago. It’s all becoming surreal, Danarius no more than a corpse nearby. He’s almost afraid to look at it, lest it turn out to just be more slavers, or worse the magister would be rising up and truly out to kill Fenris, leave only a burning husk in his wake. It always seemed like the man hardly needed his pet guard around, that he’d die by the elf’s hand seems unthinkable.  
While he’s vaguely aware of the others crowding near him, closer than he wants to be with anyone at the moment, even the slow magic tending to his arm makes him flinch roughly, enough that he turns his head to lash out with a quick glare out of the corner of his eyes. Varania’s words wouldn’t have sunk in otherwise, and he turns his attention back towards her with no less violence behind his tone. "Don’t call me that!”

“He was going to make me his apprentice. I would have been a magister.” Varania’s tone is level, though edging towards despair. It’s not clear if she offers her words as an explanation or an excuse. But perhaps tellingly, she does not so much as glance toward the fallen magister’s corpse.  
“Your sister is a mage?” Anders speaks up, incredulous, edging the slightest bit nearer. Whether Fenris had only just remembered, or if he’d neglected to mention it, it doesn’t speak well for Varania’s chances at winning any understanding from him.

Fenris’ eyes flicker for a brief moment towards Anders, the movement unseen save from Varania, and he doesn’t respond to it. He takes a step closer to her, pointedly pulling his arm out of Anders’ range in the process no matter how much the nerves in his arm are screaming at the slightest movement, clearly set on murdering her just as much as he killed Danarius. His clawed gauntlet, covering in his master’s blood, catches her shoulder and pulls her closer. “But you would have seen me killed for it?! I would have given you everything.”

“Leto, he swore he wouldn’t harm you. If you murder me for this so be it, but do not do so believing I would have betrayed you to your death. He wanted you back, not dead.” Varania lifts her head, finding some sort of strength in grim resignation. “You have no idea what we went through – what I’ve had to do since mother died. This was my only chance…” For a moment there’s a plea in Varania’s face, and in her voice, a wrenching hint at things not spoken.

Fenris pushes her back against the wall, though still at arm’s length, the simple fact of her being a mage enough to justify him and keep some distance from her. His eyes grow pained at her words, though his clear intent barely falters as he releases his grip on his sword, the hilt hitting the floor first and the around nearly enough to make him jump, and his claws flex and glow as they phase. “/And you believed him!/ You’re no better than he was.”

“Don’t do this, Leto! You don’t think you’d be dead if he wanted that? He stared you in the face and let you stand! Please… please don’t let him do this!” Varania cowers and tries to pull away, looking past Fenris’s shoulder to Anders and the others – all of whom start forwards. But Anders is closest, and it’s his voice, soft and aching, that speaks into his ear.  
“Fenris. Stop this now. This isn’t what you want.”

Though it takes all of his will to not dig into her for those words Fenris balls his fist tightly, the glow finally shuddering and vanishing. His pause is clear in his eyes, taking heed at the other mage’s words even when every adrenaline sparking muscle in him is telling him to do otherwise. “/Get out./”

Varania pulls away when Fenris releases her. For a moment, she can’t take her eyes off his face. But then, she winces and looks away, and she brushes past him, hastening for the door to the street. Anders watches her go, his concentration divided and his mind and magic at work again on the burn on Fenris’s arm.

Though he half-turns to watch her go, even casts Anders another small warning look, he doesn’t pull away from the touch of magic at his arm this time. “I thought finding her would give me a sense of belonging, but I was wrong. Magic has tainted that too, and I have nothing.” The words were quiet, half to himself and trailing off though he looks ready to say more, a small moment of public vulnerability before he steels. But he still hasn’t looked in Danarius’ direction since he left him. Fenris lifts his sword and turns to leave, the tendrils of healing stretching then snapping as they lose connection with him. “I need to get out of here.”

Fenris sighs, utterly baffled by Anders’ actions. Though it’s a bit awkward from his perch on the stairs he slips his feet lower on the steps to either side of the mage as he leans forward to loop an arm around his shoulders. He spreads his hand to pull Anders into a tight kiss, one decidedly much too short. “I think you’ve gone mad.”

 

“I’m mad? You’re the one who accepted.” Anders leans into the kiss, his hands braced on the step above him, on either side of Fenris’s hips. “Now will you believe me when I say you’re not alone?”

Fenris sighs again, though a shorter amused huff this time, only really noticeable when Anders is this close. “Fine.” He goes quiet, looks down at the stone edge between them as he props his forehead against Anders, solemn. He really does want to take back everything he said, and seems nervous that he’d destroy what they’ve made with the lightest touch. “You’re going to remind me of him. But everything you’ve done for me… you’re far more than he ever was. Realize that?”

Anders nods his head, letting his lips brush against Fenris’s jaw. "…I know. I… know, when I crawl out of my own mire, that you didn’t mean… a lot of that. It’s alright, Fenris, if you need to grieve.“ He draws back a bit, looking Fenris in the eyes through a stray wisp of hair. Some part of his mind gives him a nudge, and he smiles helplessly at the realization that he just put a ring on that. And then, cold rainwater drips onto his head, trickling down his nose. "We… probably ought to move.”

For a moment Fenris looks deeply pained and somber, gaze hard to lock onto, as if he’d managed to completely shove out of his mind what even happened barely hours earlier. Until the mage mentioned it. But it’s lost when he flinches back a couple inches as the water splashes on Anders, a small cold spray between them. Careful not to topple either of them he stands, takes a couple steps back to the top floor and reaches out to offer a hand. “Funny, that you can heal bodies so easily but you’d balk if I told you to fix that bowl.”

Anders takes Fenris’s hand and hops up the last couple of steps easily, looping an arm around the elf’s shoulders. “I’d balk if Hawke told me to. If you told me to, I’d learn pottery.”

Fenris’ shoulders tense at the sudden movement but relaxes just as quickly. For some reason it makes him remember his arm, and he glances down as he lightly taps at the skin with his opposite hand. “You’d try and give up, you mean.”

“I’d try, though. I’m sorry I can’t promise I’d be any good at it.” Anders moves to guide the both of them back to the bedroom, where it’s less leaky and probably warmer. 

“Even if you had been, it’s not what I meant.” It’s a place where less rain catchers have been tumped over, in any case. The fire is going enough to warm the stone around it more than the air, leaving the bedroom if nothing else more comfortable on their feet. Fenris sits at the edge of the bed, leans forward to prop his elbows on his thighs, and finally begins to look more shellshocked than he even had in the tavern.

Anders sinks down on the bed beside Fenris, hip to hip with him. “Oh, love….” His voice is muted and tender. He falls silent, then, nothing to say that he can’t say simply by being there.

Fenris doesn’t have anything to say to that, for a time. What is there to say, really. Nobody is going to mourn the man’s death, and he doesn’t feel like he should either. And yet he still feels this hole inside of him. It’s strange, and doesn’t hurt like he thought it would, the way Anders makes it sound like he should, more like his entire midsection is just numb. “…how am I supposed to feel about this?”

Anders shrugs, a puff of air blowing past pursed lips. “Damned if I know. But at a guess… I think you’re supposed to say goodbye. So… whatever that feels like.” Scratching his head, Anders turns to give Fenris a sheepish look. “You’re a very complicated man.”

Fenris gulps at the thoughts ‘saying goodbye’ brings up. It’s just a mess of uncertainty, something he’s never done before outright, much less afterwards. He never said goodbye to the fog warriors after killing them, just let it stir in his gut until he left. But being lost doesn’t seem so complicated, and he looks up. “How?”

“You’re just.. Things that seem too simple to even break down get all.. augghh.” Anders shoves a hand through his hair. “Too complicated for me to explain how complicated. Or maybe not. Maybe everything else is too complicated and I’m not managing to break any of it down. I’m sorry.”

Fenris sighs, with noncommittal irritation. “What did you do for Karl?”

Anders sobers, staring at the floor and after a moment, swallowing hard. “I lit a candle for him. If not for the way he died I might have lit one in the Chantry and said a prayer… not that I think there’s anyone to hear such things. But he died with that ..brand on his forehead, in a supposed sanctuary, and… ” He shakes his head slowly. “I still hate going near that place. So I lit a candle when I returned to my place in Darktown, and I knelt there and wept. I wrote down my thoughts in a letter… all the things I would have wanted to say to him if I’d known we would never speak again. And that I hoped he was at peace. And then I burned it. By then it was dawn. I don’t remember when I finally slept.”

Fenris watches Anders quietly, but in the end he just looks down again. “I can’t imagine any of those things would be appropriate.” With that he’s silent again, at first thinking and then just.. silent, entirely. Somehow even the mansion seems quiet at Danarius’ death, though he knows anything he feels is likely undeserved. Without a word he lists to one side to lean against the mage, turns his head to prop the broad bridge of his nose against Ander’s shoulder. “Danarius is the only thing that’s never changed as long as I can remember. Even when I escaped Tevinter, he followed me.”

“Not all changes are for the worse,” Anders says softly. He keeps still as Fenris leans into him, turning his head to glance at the crown of the elf’s head, and the lean body against him. “You truly have your freedom, now… even though you walked a long, hard road to reach it. If I know you at all, I think you’ll find it was worth the cost.”

“But I don’t /feel/ free. I realize.. that statement is ridiculous, when I don’t even know what free is. I’m not sure what I expected it to feel like. He weighs as heavily on my mind as before, and I’m lost, never planned or intended to get this far. What do you do when you have nothing?”

“You stop running,” Anders answers softly. “You look around, you give some thought to what you need and to what you want. You decide what you need to do to get it. And sometimes, if you’re lucky, it’s as easy as asking.”

“You sound as if you tried to do just that.”

“I’m here, aren’t I?” Anders kisses the top of Fenris’s head. “I should admit, though, you’re not what I thought I needed. At least, not until I realized I couldn’t live without you.”

Fenris huffs softly, the air brushing Anders’ arm. “I did hate you, at first. Even when I thought about you on nights I couldn’t sleep.” And implied other things. “But you’re different than the others.”

“The others, or the other mages?” Anders rests his cheek on Fenris’s head lightly. He can breathe in the smell of his hair this way, and he realizes how comforting he finds that. His cheeks color a bit at the implication that even when they were constantly at odds, Fenris had still harbored fantasies… but that seems like a conversation for another time.

Fenris grumbles. “You know what I mean, mage.” It’s Fenris, of course other mages. It wouldn’t be him if he didn’t call attention to it constantly. “As for the /others/… that I hated you was still more of a connection than any impression they had. I didn’t feel any connection to Isabela the way we do now.”

“Then, I hope you can see that connection is also a bridge you can build with somebody, as you and Isabela did. Though… potentially with less groping and fucking.”

Though he’s pressed against Anders’ shoulder Fenris cracks a small, if sad, smirk. “Who do I know that I haven’t bedded.”

“Varric, unless there’s something you should be telling me. And Hawke, and Merrill, and Orana, and Bethany. Oh, and Choirboy. There, now you can go down the list and tell me why none of them 'count’.” Anders nuzzles at Fenris’s scalp.

He was expecting that, and closes his eyes at the touch. “Easily. They’re ‘Hawke’s friends’, and I owe him a debt. We would go our separate ways, otherwise.” This certainly isn’t working out his issues lingering about Danarius. But it’s more comfortable to ignore the fact that he’s gone, this way. Fenris imagines himself cracking if he thinks on it too deeply, right now, too soon after the fact to come to grips with it.

“And they could be your friends, if you let them. If you want them to be, that is.” Anders sighs and flops onto his back, hands under his head. 

Fenris straightens as Anders pulls away, half turns to watch him but doesn’t join him just yet. “It never feels that comfortable. What is it?”

“Sometimes you have to push through the uncomfortable, awkward parts. Assuming you decide it’s worth it. If you want my advice, though, I encourage you to give it some thought. You’re lonely, and it doesn’t have to be this way. I wish I could make everything better for you, but this is something you need to do, not have done for you.” Anders frowns, obviously worried that his words might be too harsh. “I’m sorry, love, you make me worry…”

Maybe it was too far. Fenris goes quiet for a few long moments, the only sound between them the pattering of rain as he looks away and threads his fingers through his hair. “I’ll.. keep it in mind.” But he is genuine about it. “What makes you think I would fare better if I ‘knew’ them? How would it change anything?” He feels as agreeable as he’s going to ever be around them. They play cards, and drink. There’s just not much he can imagine changing.

“It might change the way you feel.” Anders stops there, propping himself partly up on his elbows to watch Fenris for a moment. “Never mind. I’m here to help you, whatever you want or need. I just might need you to tell me how to be of use, sometimes.”

Fenris looks up at that, hand dropping almost immediately. “I don’t recall wanting you just for you to fix me.”

Anders smiles rakishly. “Good, because I don’t love you because I think you’re broken.”

Fenris drops his arms as he shifts his shoulders back, the heels of his palms sinking against the bed as they take his weight. His chin drops to his chest before his gaze drifts towards the door. “Then don’t simply help me. Just.. continue as you were.”

Anders follows Fenris’s gaze, but he makes no move to rise. “Fair enough. As long as you’re not shooing me away.” He glances instead to Fenris’s hand, and the ring on his finger. As long as that remains, he tells himself, he still wants me. And that makes him smile in spite of everything.

Something about those words are an unexpected spine to his side. Normally Fenris would just grumble, but today his reply is a hint more violent, without even looking back towards Anders. “Why, because I like it alone so you would just leave if I told you to? If it’s so easy, go.” A part of him knows it’s too far the moment he says it, but once it’s out he falls silent, unable to find words to make it seem like he 'didn’t mean it that way’. It was too clear for that.

Anders sits up abruptly, shifting away from Fenris toward the foot of the bed. His eyes are glowing, but more with perplexity and frustration than actual anger. “Fortunately for you it is not so easy, elf. Nor is it clear to me in the slightest whether you prefer solitude or despise it, when you lament it yet stay frozen in inaction. Even now you reach out with one hand and repel with the other. Mortals are nearly incomprehensible at the best of times, but you I cannot decipher.”

The change in tone gets Fenris’ attention immediately, half flinching away to the defensive before realizing a moment later that Justice isn’t exactly on the attack. So instead he manages to shoot a small glare, weak as it is. “It isn’t so simple. Is that all you see?”

“I see you suffer,” Justice answers. “I see… fear, as well. And a struggle to thrive, though what you struggle against is more obscure to me. I readily believe that it is not a simple matter.”

Fenris looks back down as he tries to think, passing over the bright blue cracks on Anders’ skin, then his own scars. As much as he doesn’t care about the demon’s opinions, knowing Anders will hear it means something. Enough for him to struggle through talking, and actually make an effort. “Solitude is easier. Who have I known that hasn’t been spoiled by magic into betraying me? Even now, we’ve been swallowed by it.”

“Do I betray you simply by being here?” Justice’s voice is soft, uncharacteristically gentle. “It is not my wish to cause you any further grief. I think you mislay the blame for your fears, but … I understand why you would feel this way.” Justice looks down at his empty hands, as if envisioning something cupped within them. “The trust you place in Anders is more rare and fragile than he even realizes. No wonder he makes your temper flare.” Justice can’t help smirking as Anders chafes at being discussed.

“No.” The sound is quiet, the elf transparently troubled with his averted eyes, less shy and more trying to focus less on the demon and more on shuffling his mind together. Things seem so obvious and clear until he tries to explain them. “My own sister betrayed me for magic, Danarius ready to kill me if he couldn’t take me back. Am I supposed to keep trying to trust mages?” He stops at that, raises a hand to prop his forehead into in agitation. “One, I do. Anything more is ridiculous.”

“If you had not been open at all to trusting this mage, which was the case for many years, would your life not be poorer for it? I do not mean to suggest you should give trust where it isn’t earned. That would be foolishness.”

Fenris grumbles. “Then no one else has earned it.” But he stops, again, with more of a forced effort. “I think.. that you misunderstand me. When I say I am alone, it is less everyone I do know and more everyone I had known, that have left holes in me.”

Justice looks stricken by that. It hadn’t made sense, before, how Fenris could be so hurt even in taking revenge on Danarius. He considered it first in terms of what it would be like if he and Anders were torn asunder. It would be the most grievous wound Justice could imagine being dealt to him. He wonders if that kind of loss is a feeling Anders has known and survived, but when he reaches back to sift through his memories he finds Anders reticent, drawing away with a sharp refusal. It’s all he can do not to roll his eyes and mutter “Mortals.” “You have endured losses I cannot fathom.”

“I realized.” It comes off harsher than he intended, but it’s a simple enough truth when Justice had made himself known in the first place. But as much as 'losses’ is rightfully plural, there’s only one of them Fenris can think about with that word. “I was under an impression that what I felt about Danarius’ death would be… different. But he is dead, and I feel no better for it, even if the slavers leave.”

That rebuke does smart a bit. But Justice is patient. “What you feel is what you feel. There is no purpose served in speculating upon what you 'should’ feel. It is a discussion I have had betimes with Anders and it leads nowhere. Honor your heart. It is what it is, and it needs be nothing more or less than that. As for ourselves… we offer comfort and companionship. Anders wishes only to hold you close and share his life with you. I do not know if this is any balm to your wounds. This feeling, too, is what it is.” Justice bows his head, the cool blue light of magic fading from Anders eyes, like the light of a lamp being carried away down an endlessly long corridor.

Fenris is only distantly aware that Justice is 'gone’ at first, simply from the faint blue tones lighting the room dying down. It takes him a few moments of silence to himself to actually realize that leaves him with Anders and not just on his own again. “For all that I confuse your demon, he baffles me all the more. Does he ever warn you?”

Anders nods. “Sometimes not in as many words but I feel him when he has something to say. Tonight he’s just… fretting over you, to be honest. He believes in taking action against the ills of the world, so it doesn’t sit well with him when you’re hurting.” Anders raises one foot onto the bed and loosely hugs his knee. “Not that I cope with it so very well myself. I love you, you know.”


	32. Chapter 32

(note: these events begin directly after Legacy. -broody)

By the time it’s over, Anders hurts, body and soul. Fenris hasn’t spoken to him on the way back to Hightown and he has allowed that silence to persist. He aches. His movements are weary, and his gingerliness is unusual; the healer is normally well able to heal himself. But this day he neglected. He left whatever wounds he felt he could live with, because he needed the pain. The pain was something he knew was his, something he could hold onto to anchor himself and drown out the whispers and insinuations, the skittering madness of the Taint and the furious clamor of Justice, rejecting that dark part that was an indelible stain on Anders. 

 

Head bowed, the Apostate leans his staff against the wall, and he hangs his coat beside it. The tunic underneath has fresh blood on it, and the cloth is so threadbare that the bruises on Anders’s skin are visible underneath. Anders cups his hands against his temples again, shaking his head. It must still be faint echos in his mind from hours spent in the Deep Roads, but he can almost still feel Corypheus whisper in his head.  
Perhaps he shouldn’t be surprised, but Orana is there to meet them, standing near the doorway to the kitchen. There are lamps lit even though the night has grown late, and the elvhen woman is in a thin shift of a nightdress. Her expression is relieved, though, and for her, Anders even manages to smile.  
“You made it. I can draw a bath for you if you wish.”  
“It’s alright, Orana. You’re kind to wait up for us.”  
“And Serrah Hawke? He’s well?”  
“Well and home and in better shape than I am. You can check in on him tomorrow and see for yourself.”

Fenris is silent even as he looks up to Orana. Any sharp glare lingering on his face at least fades to simply intense, but he nods minutely and looks away a moment later to nothing in particular. He reaches back to pull his sword from his back, even that action slower and wearier than usual, and sets it to the wall near the staff, hand lingering on the pommel as his body fights the instinct to just lean against the support. With a heavy but silent sigh he forces his arm to drop and straightens. Before he never would have dreamed leaving the sword farther than arm’s reach, but after today and with Danarius gone he decides he no longer cares. Simpler intruders than slavers wouldn’t be able to so much as pick it up anyway, and he still has his own body. Being grateful for it would be incorrect, but there’s some small comfort in knowing he can never be completely disarmed.  
With a curt and icy look, as if the mage needed anything else shot at him, he just turns to head up the stairs as he starts to unlatch his gauntlets.

Anders catches that glare and looks back, wounded, lonely. When he looks away, Orana is touching his arm, giving him a sympathetic stare.  
“Are you in trouble?” she asks, her voice pitched low and quiet.  
“Probably,” Anders answers, hanging his head.  
“There are some blankets by the hearth.” And she says goodnight with a kiss on Anders’s shoulder, a startling kindness that makes him feel, for the first time all day, that his world isn’t coming to an end. He watches her go, but she doesn’t turn back as she slips away down a corridor.  
Blowing out the lamps in the main room, Anders follows up the stairs. "Am I welcome here tonight?“

"Don’t be an idiot.” It’s impossible to tell what kind of answer that is, the tone still fuming as Fenris unhooks and works the other gauntlet off of his fingers. But he must realize how ambiguous the comment is, because as they pass the doorway he half-turns while setting the armor down. “Fortunately for you I can only want to kill you while I’m awake, mage.” Yes, he’s back to his old habits again, growling the word like a curse. He busies himself to work the last piece of metal from his chest, but adds with a grumble, “I can keep an eye on you this way.”

Anders steps inside, albeit hesitantly, watching Fenris move as the warrior sheds his armor. “What did I do? I can beg your forgiveness but I’d like to know what I did that you hate me for.” He crouches down a bit too quickly and quietly grunts at the pain as his ribs compress. He works his bootlaces loose and kicks his boots off, rolled socks quickly following.

The remains of the armor are practically dropped to the table, the loud pound against the wood punctuating Anders’ question. His shoulders roll loose, arms dropping to his side. Even beyond his anger is some small shock. “What did you do. Are you truly that blind?” The elf falls silent a moment as it sinks in that yes, this is a real question, and he shakes his head as he unbuttons his top, the movements in his hands jerking and frustrated, fuel to his venom, words more a threat then concern. “Never loose yourself again.”

“Do you think I wanted to?!” Anders could almost laugh, he’s so incredulous. He pulls his tunic off over his head and throws it aside, showing a wealth of bruises and barely-closed cuts on his body. “Do you think I even wanted to be there?! You know how much I hate the blighted Deep Roads, and you think I went there to just tantalizingly wiggle my tainted mind in front of a corrupted ancient Magister? How many times did I have to say I wanted it to stop?! How many times did I have to beg for help before you cared enough to reach out to me?”

The elf’s top is practically peeled off, a mix of blood and dirt discarded with it and leaving skin and a thin layer of drying sweat. “Cared enough!?” Fenris is fast as it is, but with his decisive movements and nothing of weight to hinder him barely a second passes as he strides forward to catch Anders’ neck. But his hand barely even tightens against the man’s throat before he stops himself. “It’s an easy thing to die. But if anyone is going to kill you, I am. Don’t deny me that.”

Anders looks perplexed.  
“Fenris…”  
Carefully, lightly, he guides Fenris’s other wrist with his hand, bringing it to a tender spot below his ribs. The bruise there has four barely-healed punctures, as if put there by a fist in a spiked gauntlet. “Too dangerous to be left alone.” Anders remembers those words from the night Fenris kissed him and all this seemed set in motion between them.  
“I don’t think you have to worry. You nearly did.”

“Nearly means nothing. Hawke was going to.” It was true enough, had been a sharp pain in his chest whenever he’d been knocked back but Hawke had been able to get past the abomination’s defenses in his place. Fenris’ breath falters a moment, chest rising and falling faster as his fingers bend and press the pads along the mark. “I was ready to lose you and you dare still be alive as if nothing happened.”

Anders winces in pain when Fenris presses at the bruise. “I’m sorry, Fenris. I tried to fight, I tried with all that was in me. It wasn’t enough. I’m grateful I’m still here, but….” He shakes his head. “I never wanted you to go through that. I don’t belong… like this. With another person. You’re wasted on me.”

“Shut up.” Fenris crumples, his knees dropping to the edge of the bed to either side of Anders’ lap, leans closer. He turns his hand on the mage’s neck to pull his chin up and into a rough kiss, his lips pressed hard enough against his teeth to hurt between them before he breaks it. Then, finally, his grip tightens somewhat. “You can’t make that choice.”

Anders lets his arms resting a loose circle around Fenris’s waist while that aching kiss endures. He’s grateful for it, sighing when their lips part, tense and weary body easing. “No, I can’t,” he confirms. He leans his forehead on Fenris’s shoulder, closing his eyes, wondering how the elf can smell somehow like rain after they’ve been in the Deep Roads for days. “I hope it isn’t selfish that I’m glad you were there. And that you still will be. I promise you the final blow.” There’s a faint echo to his voice as he makes that oath.

Fenris’ hand drops, his other gently sliding upward until both are level together on Anders’ chest. He leans his temple against the blonde mess of hair, and turns his chin just enough to bury his lips against it and breathe in. “Even if I’m denied it I would rather be there and ingrain your final moments in my mind, than not and never know. I want everything, even your end, even if I can’t bear it.”

“You make me want to live,” Anders murmurs. "You make me hope the end is very far away.“ Anders embrace grows tight around Fenris, his shoulders bunching, shaking. "Fenris…” Anders feels as if his heart is in his throat as he lifts his face to kiss Fenris fiercely.

Fenris’ hands drag up to either side of Anders’ jawline, palms resting in the crook while his fingers spread over the man’s stubble, brush his ears and thread the tips of nails into his hair. Very gently he breaks their kiss, the slightest pressure to hold Anders steady as he pulls back, and presses his lips between the mage’s eyebrows, smoothing at the muscle there. “I’m here.”

Anders looks back into Fenris’s eyes, his own eyes typically weary, but filled with a sort of awe and wonder. He is at a loss for words, and so he simply answers with another kiss, this one light and tender and restrained to the point he seems to subtly shake with it. The tenderness in his eyes when the kiss ends seems to say that he could feel safe and content nowhere but beside Fenris.

Fenris’ hands loosen and sink from Anders’ face, stretch forward and then settle with his forearms resting loosely along the mage’s shoulders. There’s a small insignificant sound back in the mansion, a barely audible pop either from Orana or simply the building’s wood settling amongst the stone, but the elf glances back over his shoulder towards the door all the same, his long ear in view before he sighs and accepts it as nothing. Even now not having his sword at the ready is proving to be a little more agitating than he expected. Fenris turns his head back, props his forehead against Anders’, glancing down between them as if he’s noticed something for the first time. “You’re hurt.” Though it’s more minor surprise than worry, that the age hadn’t healed himself by now.

Anders nods. “I needed the pain. It helped me focus. Otherwise I would’ve been alone in my head with Corypheus.” Anders looks vaguely nauseated at the thought. “I can’t believe it turned out to be true…” Anders’s voice sounds more despairing than incredulous, though. “We really do destroy everything we touch.”

Fenris hesitates, silent a moment at the statement, to start this. As much as he feels oddly comfortable with their explosive arguments, he’s reluctant to do anything that would predictably force him to get up.  
But he can’t just leave it, his eyes turning stern. “Danarius wasn’t enough proof for you? You simply believe everything unpleasant is a lie?”

“I didn’t think what the Chantry accuses Mages of could even be done, whether I believed the Magisters would have tried it or not. I believe that those in power lie to justify their position.” Anders’s tone is sharp, but he doesn’t pull away, for all that he bows his head rather than look Fenris in the eyes. “And now I don’t know what to believe. I don’t want the truth to be this… cruel.”

“/Cruel/?” Fenris practically coughs out the word. “What did you think Tevinter is, exactly? The quarry outside of /this city/ didn’t tell you enough?” The ending of his small outburst is snarled, but he doesn’t move either save the muscles along his arms, still settled against Anders’ shoulders, tensing.

“Is that all I’m capable of, then? Is that what magic leads to? And if it is, why was I born? Why don’t the Templars just put us to the sword when they find us, infants, children, all? If magic is nothing but a scourge.. then I’ve been wrong about everything.” Anders doesn’t lift his head. 

Fenris sighs heavily against Anders’ hair, and tries not to roll his eyes. But Anders is folding too fast for this to be a fair fight. “So you’ll just wallow in your misery here, then, instead of doing something about it?”

Anders almost growls, his sigh frustrated, irritated, exasperated… and probably a hint of something else. He purses his lips, the corners of his mouth tight as he tries not to smile. Fenris isn’t just the one he wants. At moments like this he’s reminded, the elf is the one he needs. “Here I was, thinking you’d be happy I’d finally recognized my place in the order of things. There is simply no pleasing you, elf.”

This time he /does/ roll his eyes, glancing up to the ceiling, though more towards himself. “I’m aware. But as much as it may surprise you, I don’t agree with genocide. Besides, you’d keep cropping up, like bugs. If that’s the only plan you can come up with, perhaps you should build your own circle.”

“Maybe I will. But mine will have dancing on friday nights, and potluck suppers, and a petting zoo, and a bakery, and a seraglio, and a taproom, and… and… Well, it bears considering. But mine would be MUCH nicer.”

Fenris practically snorts at that as he looks back down. “Oh yes, everything will be fun and games and you’ll likely let them roam wherever they want to go.”

“But why would they want to leave? They would miss out on all the potluck suppers and the singalongs and the orgies. And, come on, we’d have a bakery. A bakery, Fenris. It would be perfect and you know it.”

Now he’s just being ridiculous. “And why would they want to stay, when they’ve been kept to circles thusfar? What would you do if one didn’t want to go through the Harrowing? Nothing, so they could turn into an abomination and kill someone first?”

“Stop ruining my idea.” Anders lifts his head to pout at Fenris.

Fenris had been looking down sterner than he’d even intended, fully wanting to squash Anders’ hopes and dreams, but it softens against his will as the mage’s gaze catches his. “Fantasizing does nothing.”

“Every endeavor begins as an idea, does it not?” There’s a clear glimmer of mischief in Anders’s eyes, tinged with a bit of tenderness when he notices Fenris’s glare faltering. "Just because the idea isn’t perfect at the moment of it’s inception doesn’t mean it should just be abandoned.“

Any hint of harsh tones dies from Fenris’ voice, too cemented to the spot to make any real negative commitments to the conversation. Though at this point he wonders if they’re being lazy or if arguing has elevated to a level of flirting at this point. "An idea is never going to be perfect if you aren’t realistic. But it suits you, doesn’t it, wanting the answer handed to you with no enduring.”

“Why should I make it more difficult than it has to be? I suppose I could try it your way and brood things over for a few weeks, that might work out the kinks. But I suspect you’d refer to that as wallowing in my own misery – oh, do I detect some manner of double standard here? When elves do it it’s ‘thinking’ but mages 'wallow’? I’m on to your game now, elf.” Anders is trying not to smile, but for the most part failing.

It earns him Fenris’ returning irritation. “I don’t recall being forlorn and asking if we should kill all elves. If you actually paused to think you might have a single productive thought in your head beyond what your demon tells you.”

“Maybe I just keep the productive ones to myself because I know what sharing them with you will get me.” Anders frowns, Fenris’s words obviously getting under his skin. “Or maybe, and I admit I’m pushing my luck with this but maybe, just because you and whoever else doesn’t understand what I’m getting at within twenty seconds of me opening my mouth, it means you’re the ones failing to keep pace.”

Fenris leans back in place and slides his arms from Anders’ shoulders to cross them, though if only because there’s no where else to put them if not on the mage. “Then enlighten me. How is this utopia not ignoring everyone else’s well being?” Because from where he’s sitting, as intimately close as it may be, it looks like the cheerful beginnings of a new Tevinter.

“My manifesto is in the top drawer of my desk, if you really want to read about my actual absurd utopian fantasies. But at the core of it is one idea. That if we treat mages as people and not monsters, mages would be far more likely to act the part. That if we are a part of our society, with a stake in its stability and well-being, most of us will work to preserve that. And that the right to freedom, to a productive life and a happy one if at all possible, is something inherent to all people. Taking that away from mages is taking away something fundamentally human… and then what are we left with? Just an aching void for demons to fill.” Anders looks Fenris in the eyes with fierce intensity as he speaks, even the customary soft weariness they tend to have fading from his face. He doesn’t take his arms from Fenris’s waist, however. “I will discuss this with you if you truly wish it, love,” he says. “But not tonight. Tonight I ask that you respect me enough to let those words stand and to give them some real consideration before you rebut me. I will listen to you… just… let’s not get into a genuine fray right now, I’m tired and I’m heartsick and you’re too beautiful.”

 

Fenris doesn’t have to wait to know his answers. The entire speech feels well intentioned but absurd. But, and he feels he may come to regret this later, he relents for now. “Well, now I know which drawer to pull kindling from first.” But he stops, pointedly even to himself.. “Fine, I’ll leave your absurd madness for now.”

 

“ I’d just rewrite it if you burned it. Which would mean more hours spent in my study and fewer spent in bed with you.”

“Mm. It might not be a problem, I suppose I’ve never fucked you in the study.”

Anders swallows. "I’m adding that to the list, then.“

Fenris smirks a little at that, unfolding his hands to prop support against Anders’ shoulders while he leans in for a small, teasing kiss. "You have too many books there.” Not exactly the most comfortable or stable things to fuck on.

“They’re only books. They’ll survive a night on the floor.” Anders is hooked by that kiss, leaning forward to try and keep contact when Fenris pulls back from it. "Why do you smell so good right now? You’ve been in the Deep Roads for days, wearing leather armor, but somehow you come out smelling like rain-washed earth. Is this some kind of lyrium trick?“

Fenris knits his brow a moment in utter confusion, gently jerks his head out of Anders’ reach. “I assumed a mage would know what lyrium smells like.” Which is to say, not much of anything last he recalled. “What are you on about now, I don’t imagine I smell like anything other than dirt and sweat.” 

Anders pouts faintly at being denied his kiss. "Maybe I’m imagining things,” he says, but then he immediately pulls Fenris down with him onto the bed and rolls onto him to maul him with snufflings. "No, no, it’s definitely coming from you. This is your -sweat-? Andraste’s tits, I shouldn’t be surprised that even your body odor is beautiful.“

Escaping from a kiss is one thing but with nowhere else to back away Fenris is easily toppled over and tackled. He freezes for a moment in surprise, an arm still stretched up in the air with a tense claw before it relaxes and slowly sinks to Anders’ back. "What are you /doing/.” Not that he’s trying to drag himself away, simply completely baffled, until it hits him. “I smell like an /elf/, mage.” And with a grumble, adds, “Go to the alienage, I’m sure you’ll find the smell prevalent there.”

“I’m supposed to go sniffing strange elves? What would that say about me? I don’t imagine most elves would stand for it.” Anders goes on with his snuffling and nuzzling, making his way up Fenris’s belly and shamelessly stuffing his face into the elf’s armpit. “Maker, they should start bottling this.”

“I’m sure they have.” Though he has no idea how, and he doesn’t really want to dwell on it, but it must if it has this effect.  
Or, Anders is just mad. Both options seem fair.  
Fenris makes a small jump as Anders burrows against the crook of his arm, for a moment his hand shooting to the mage’s shoulder, but he never gets around to shoving him away. He settles again, and tries not to flinch when Anders catches a sensitive spot. Come to think of it, nobody’s ever touched that section of skin, as far as he can remember. “Alright, alright. Enjoy it now before I take a bath to spite you.”

Anders breathes in deep and then begins playfully kissing his way down Fenris’s flank. Somewhere along the way to the joint of his thigh it occurs to him that Fenris is humoring him, and that on the rather dark spectrum of Fenris moods and behavior, this qualifies as absolute besottedness.  
He lifts his head, just a hint of color in his cheeks. “You -really- love me,” he states, sounding almost incredulous. He glances to Fenris’s hand and sees the tarnished band of his ring there. “You -really- let me put a ring on your finger. You… I… I am truly, disgustingly fortunate.”

Fenris props himself up onto his elbows, if only to shoot Anders with a small look. Not quite a glare, but impatience and some disbelief that he’s still even indirectly questioning it. “If you haven’t gathered that much by now, I can’t help you.”

“I have, I just… It’s incomprehensibly wonderful. I might be able to understand, in theory, that things this wonderful could occasionally happen in this world. But that it’s not just possible, and it’s not only actually happening but it’s actually happening to me? You are /wonderful/. I don’t even have the words to say what a miracle you are.” Anders slips his arms under the small of Fenris’s back while he speaks, his tired eyes wide and amazed. He shakes his head slightly and finds himself smiling, beaming up at Fenris as he hugs his waist. Then, with a shy, helpless laugh, he buries his face against Fenris’s belly, laughing as he nuzzles him there.

The elf’s expression hardly looks like he’s buying any of it. Instead of any of his usual glare he glances back to the wine bottle by the bed, though it’s too far and more importantly empty, and closes his eyes with a exasperated sigh. “I need a drink to ignore this is happening.”

Anders seems to deflate with a sigh, his bubble effectively burst. “Fine, fine, I’ll keep my drippy 'feelings’ to myself.” He rolls onto his side and lets go of Fenris, sprawling on his back with his eyes drifting shut.

Fenris props himself higher to sit up, heels of his palms pressed against the mattress as he watches Anders quizzically. “Do you always abandon people when you’re uncomfortable?”

“I thought you didn’t want me gushing over you. For abandonment I certainly didn’t make it very far, did I?” Anders opens one eye a sliver, watching Fenris. “One might even speculate that you could do all manner of things to tempt me into snuggling you, including snuggling me yourself, if you really wanted me to resume.”

Fenris just matches his gaze, though what he’s looking for appears to be deeper than whatever they’re talking about. He doesn’t seem to get any answer he wanted though, and he glances down at nothing in particular. “I don’t recall telling you to stop smelling my armpit until you called me an incomprehensible wonderful miracle.”

Anders opens his other eye and lifts his free arm, beckoning. “Will you come here, already?”

Fenris puffs a small, curt sigh as he sinks back against the bed. Without a word he turns, presses the flat bridge of his nose against Anders’ shoulder. He tries somewhat to burrow against the warmth, and only ends up nuzzling the mage’s skin.

Anders rolls to his side again to wrap himself completely around his lover, nuzzling in against the crook of his neck, smelling the musk at his nape and breathing it in deeply. The sound he makes is muted but audible against Fenris’s ear, and utterly content. “So much better…”

Fenris’ breathing slows as he finds some comfortable spot, forehead pressed against Anders in some way that’s better than the previous pressed against Anders, arms loose between them. “Then don’t push it when you have a good thing.”


	33. Chapter 33

No matter how suspicious something is, no matter how much of a glaring trap, if Hawke gets invited down a dark alley of the city he’s going to go. And he’s going to invite his friends along. But be sure to tell no one else where they were going. Brilliant. 

Fenris had settled on the fact that he would never fully understand the man long ago. At least Hawke had the decency to bring Anders along too; if he was going to secretly die in some tunnel deep underground so soon after gaining his freedom, the mage needed to know. Even if the knowing part would be all of a minute before he fell too.  
The elf silently groaned at the atmosphere as they passed through what looked like salvaged ships turned inside out, hulls bowed towards the suspended path and a haphazard skeleton of planks supporting it all with no visible rhyme or reason. The way was dotted with small paper lanterns, just enough to see their way but blinding the elf’s eyes from settling into night vision, leaving shadows black as pitch. The air was thick and muggy, stagnant in a way that made it impossible to smell anything. He felt like he was half blind and choking underwater beneath the docks, at this rate.  
It was unsettling. But at least nothing had happened, yet.

Anders, on the other hand, is enjoying himself. He trails along behind Hawke and Isabela and admires the lanterns, blithely incautious. In this strange and secluded nook of the Undercity, it’s highly unlikely they’ll encounter any templars, and for Anders, that’s the very essence of a pleasant outing. As for the smell of the place, while the air was thick with a few things, it was absent any chokedamp or urine, making it a decided step up from most of the rest of Darktown. "When you said we were going to a hidden market, I thought you meant Bonny Lem’s,“ Anders says. "This is a bit ritzier, don’t you think? Rather like the lanterns.”  
“We all know how much you like glowing balls, Anders,” Isabela snickers.  
“Ha, ha. Should’ve seen that coming,” Anders says. "So what kind of place is this supposed to be?“  
"An Arcane Market, my magical friend!” Hawke shoots back in a jovial tone. "I hope you’re ready to help keep me from getting fleeced on second-hand Formari trinkets.“  
Anders laughs at that. "You mean there’s a used staff salesman down here? I had no idea! I happen to be in the market for a new stick.”  
“Something with a knob on the end, like a proper wizard’s?” Isabela quips.

“You really believe there’s a market down here?” Fenris looks to Anders as he trails a couple steps behind the lot, but he really means all of them. “What, they wait like a bug in a hole in the ground, hoping someone they invite will stop by? How do they even know Hawke?” And why is nobody else asking these questions? The elf sighs faintly in frustration, getting the pronounced feeling that he’s going to be ignored and appears to be in the company of willful idiots. How they weren’t dead yet with Hawke leading them seemed like more of a miracle each passing day.  
Though the man did have a strange way of being that very miracle.  
The elf straightens noticeably and his mind falls silent, smells it first as the tunnel finally begins to open up towards what looks like a dead end ahead. But more importantly, there’s a shaft of light from what looks like miles above, carrying in fresh air with it. Every edge of the ‘room’ is crammed with stuff, every odd item never imagined in piles, and the light cascading across a bizarre, still figure in the center.  
“A customer! Thaddeus, stand straight! Places, everyone! Welcome to the Black Emporium.”  
The voice groans and hisses as if it hasn’t been used in some time, vocal chords coughing dust off of them with each hoarse word, but still it talked, and the unexpected sign of life makes the muscles in Fenris’ shoulders jump.

Anders gapes, initially, at the source of the rasping voice that greets them. The… thing… seated in the center of the room is a twisted husk, wizened and nearly mummified, but even more alarmingly it has far more than the standard allotment of arms and legs, spare warped limbs sticking out at odd angles and wrapping around the wooden throne as if the near-corpse is taking root there. But then the mage’s eyes slide away from that bizarre sight and sees… things. All the things.  
Most of it seems to be curiosities, archaic and outmoded things or fads that simply weren’t a good idea in the first place. But there are fine things, exotic things, and things Anders can only guess at the origins or utility of. But almost all of the things are, to some degree, shiny. “Look at that alchemists’ bench! Those look like leaded glass vials and everything! These screws are solid brass! Wait, is that a Qunari calligraphy set? The ink block’s in great shape! That looks like a copy of Wendelaus Carenticus’s Orisons of the Maleficarum, that’s been banned by the Chantry for four hundred years! Look at the stamp on the cover, this might be a first printing!”

Alright, so there really is a shop. That simply means there’s one more idiot here that seems to not want money, or is extremely patient. Though by the look of things, the shopkeeper isn’t endangered by waiting around for long periods of time.  
But Fenris keeps quiet, the only one still keeping his eye on the thing on the throne wary at how old it is and who it may have been at one point. With the magic needed to keep it somehow alive in that shape, he wouldn’t be surprised if the emporium was a remnant of Tevinter’s filthy talons here. It leaves a bad taste in his mouth.  
Still.. there appears to be a child here. He isn’t terrified, nor has the cold soulless eyes the elf once had, and in fact looks bored and fidgets a bit. Just.. a boy being told to not get in the way when guests are there. It’s his expression that finally puts Fenris a bit more at ease, and his eyes slowly edge away from the shop owner towards Anders’ excited babbling. He answers it with his usual growl, hiding any lingering unease under it. “Why, you wanted to brush up on your blood magic? Buy it so I can burn it.”

“It’s not a spellbook, it’s a satirical play,” Anders answers with an irritated edge in his voice. “It’s based on an abortive peasant uprising against the first Circle of Magi, led by a retired Templar who’d gone a bit daffy in his old age. Turned out all he needed was some elfroot tea and he calmed right down again.” Anders flips the book open and shakes his head. “It’s in middle Orlesian,” he sighs. “Probably safer here than with me, and I can’t read it anyway.” Anders meanders over to the alchemical apparatus nearby, checking all the screws, clamps, and vials.  
In the meantime, Hawke is seated cross-legged on the floor with Isabela in his lap, her lovely rump balanced on his thigh as she rummages a trunk, passing things back to Hawke now and then with a few words of “Take a look at this” or “What do you suppose this is?” or “I’ve always wanted one of these! Wait, no.” Bric a brac piles up on the floor around them, with Hawke moving a few things into a second pile of things he might be interested in buying. Finally, Isabela’s hand emerges with something that looks like a finely detailed brass scarab. She hefts it in her palm. “Lighter than it looks. And here I was going to say it was a nice paperweight, but truly I have no idea.” She tosses it back over her shoulder and shakes her head head. It rolls to a stop near Fenris’s feet.

Fenris had generally concluded to follow Anders’ trail and make snide comments over his shoulder as necessary. He’d noticed some things obscurely Tevinter, but he had no intention of pointing them out much less have an interest in any of it. Nor did he particularly care what sword was strapped to his back, as long as it was considerably heavy. Now and then Hawke would pull something off a body he claimed was better, and Fenris took it without question. And that was that.  
It’s when he looks down to something cold and metal touching the edge of his foot, the shop keeper droning on to Isabela and Hawke about something she’s pulled out, that he chokes a sharp cough and shies back a couple steps away from the object, too quiet for the others but quite clear for the mage beside him.

“Mmmh?” Anders feels a brush of Fenris’s shoulder against his, and without even thinking about it he reaches out to slip an arm around the elf. He turns to give him a questioning look, noticing Fenris’s unease. He follows where the elf’s eyes point, and sees the odd brass thing sitting on the floor. Anders steps forward and crouches down to pick the scarab up and turn it over in his palm. He can sense enchantments on the thing, whatever it is, but he can’t discern much about their nature or intention. He just feels that small catch of the thing letting him know it needs a bit of magic in order to do… whatever it was made to do. “I’ve never seen one of these before. There aren’t any markings on it either… and it’s lighter than it looks, might be hollow. Maybe some kind of keepsake box?” He shrugs as he stands, the scarab still in his hand.  
Xenon the Antiquarian trails off from whatever droning exposition he was giving Hawk and Isabela, and begins to laugh hoarsely. “Forgot… I even haaaaaaaaad…. oooooone of thooooooose…” He laughs another coughing, wheezing chuckle. “Taaaaaake it… lad… it is not… -appropriate-… for a shop with an Urchin. Not… at all…”  
Anders looks even more baffled than he was to begin with. “I… don’t know how to thank you, Ser. I don’t know /why/ to thank you, actually.”  
Xenon laughs even harder at that, an uncomfortable tremor passing through his warped frame.

Fenris had all but completely ignored the mage’s arm around him, but seems ready to take another step back as he straightens with the object in hand, watching the thing, whatever it is. Clearly he knows exactly what the contraption does, but he does end up cracking a tiny snort of a silent chuckle at Anders’ guesses. Probably not some sort of slave pithing device, then, or anything else that would leave the mage in danger.  
But he nearly chokes again when the thing in the center of the room makes a gift of it, and he just levels a stare at Anders, hoping he can be glared into submission. “You can’t be serious. What would you do with it?” You don’t even know /what/ to do with it. Pay it no mind, it’s a stupid scarab. Surely he knows this game, this mage, by now.

Anders looks back at Fenris’s glaring eyes and then down at the cryptic thing in his hands. “Paperweight, maybe? Or… the bathroom door could use a doorknob, this is about the right size. It isn’t dangerous, is it? There’s an enchantment on it but it’s dormant. I could at least try and figure out what it is. Where’s the harm in that?”  
Xenon’s attention seems to be with Isabela and Hawke once again, the two of them discussing and comparing a few enchanted daggers they’ve found.

Yes, sadly, he knows this man, and that when his focus is set on something it’s hard to dismiss. Just like a damn cat. Fenris shrugs, not intending to waste his time when he knows insisting to refuse a free item would make him suspicious, and defeatedly instead opts to just blow it off. He turns away, going back to glancing over piles of things he has no interest in. “It’s nothing. A Tevinter ornament.”

Anders holds the scarab out to Fenris after thinking for a moment. “Want to throw it off the docks, then? Might as well get some use out of it, whatever it is.” He offers a conciliatory smile as well.

Fenris stops at that and half turns back, looking down at it for a moment silently before he seems to change his mind about it. “No. It would serve better as a doorstop.” In fact he can’t think of any better revenge, if one is going to have revenge on an inanimate object. It’s silly when it can’t possibly be the one he knew, but he smirks a little as he turns away again all the same.

For a moment Anders’s entire awareness is focused on the quirk at the corner of Fenris’s perfectly-shaped lips, but then the elf turns his back and he’s left standing there with his heart pounding and his throat dry and a nascent doorstop in his hand. He takes a deep breath, squares his shoulders, and puts the scarab in his pocket. As he listens to the droning response to Hawke’s gambit in haggling down the price of a set of rings, he realizes they’re going to be here a while.

 

At least there’s an almost endless menagerie of things to look at to pass the time. Fenris quiets down, not withdrawing but no longer critical of every last thing Anders takes the remotest interest in. As they linger the elf starts pointing out quite a few other Tevinter items you wouldn’t know unless you’d been there, nearly all of them triggered by a tap of magic. Bizarre metal instruments turning out to be ink stick grinders to cure the monotony, a scroll wheel that would turn slowly enough to be read, and several other casually alien things that were no longer functional with the lyrium stripped from them long ago. Surgical instruments that could stream magic along the spine to cauterize work, or used to before the pale blue inlay was taken. He notes that they’re all antiques, probably from Kirkwall’s past. Most of it is simply matter of fact, but even for the elf it’s vaguely interesting that these things survived so long. Surprising that it hadn’t all been destroyed on the spot.  
At last Hawke is satisfied and they all part immediately as soon as they’re above ground. Fenris looks grateful for it, as much as he’d follow their leader anywhere he likes sucking in a breath of outside air just as much. “That was the last thing I expected to be down there.”

“I wish I’d known sooner. There’s a staff down there I need to start saving my coin for.” Anders’s unusual good mood persists, and he’s smiling a bit in the sunlight as he strolls along beside Fenris. The heavy shadows under his eyes are still there, though, in testament to the restless sleep he’s been having. “And I learned at least three new passages on the way there. It’s always good to find a few new boltholes.”

The way they’d ducked in had been directly halfway up the steps seperating Low and Hightown. At least it won’t be as far back to the mansion. Fenris’ actual hint of a smile had left long ago, but he’d been for the most part neutral since, in an oddly warm sort of way. A way that still includes playfully sharp quips. “If I’d known you’d be so delighted by baubles, I would have left you when I had the chance.”

Anders shuts up a moment at that, but Fenris’s tone, as usual, says more than his words. “It’s not the baubles. To go walking in the city and, for a while, feel like I didn’t need to be looking over my shoulder and keeping my head down…” Anders’s own words remind him what he should be doing, what he let slip while they walked through deserted corridors under the city. He lowers his head, and the smile on his face fades to neutrality. “… and to see a place that even… whatever he was, could somehow find and make a sanctuary, however difficult and improbable. It was like finding a few scraps of freedom, like crabgrass pushing through a cracked paving stone.”

Fenris makes a small huff through his nose. “That’s not freedom. He’s in a cage as much as everyone else. If anyone came by all he would have to do is keep silent.” They walk a ways farther up before he adds, “All you would have to do is stop carrying a staff.”

“Not carry a staff?” Anders stops short, an expression of dawning amazement on his face. “Oh, how did I not figure that out on my own! It’s so obvious when you say it. All I’d have to do is throw away my staff and nobody would ever figure out what could possibly be the story behind an inexplicably well-educated penniless drifter.” For a moment the look of bitterness on Anders’s face looks like it may as well have been borrowed from Fenris in his darker moments. “It might have been true once. But I don’t belong among /people/ anymore.”

Fenris stifles a humorless laugh, instead reroutes the energy into his words. But when he does they come out sharp, not that he seems surprised or apologetic for it. “People care less than you think, mage. Strip off everything and you’re just another human with something to hide. It’s more than I can do, don’t act as if it’s worthless.”

“And you think I could live like that, afraid to let anyone close enough that they might see me for what I really am? How much worse would it be than being rejected outright… trusting someone and then discovering they could never accept the truth.” Anders’s tone is argumentative, but then he sighs, turning to Fenris with a stricken look and he shakes his head. “It would never stop feeling like a charade. And it isn’t something I even want… living a lie while the truth eats a hole in me.”

Fenris’ eyes in response are no softer for it; while he may quiet his voice to echo Anders’ the anger just burns behind the green irises, a deep simmering heat. “What I wouldn’t give for that hole, sometimes. Feel privileged that you can have your charade at all, whether you want it or not. Some things aren’t as easy to hide, even for a moment.”

“And what would you do, if you could?” Anders sounds simply puzzled, curious, even sympathetic. “What do you think you’d gain… and what would you hide? As much as you hate your markings, I doubt they would mean much to the other elves, that they’d set you apart.” 

Fenris just scowls as he glances up, practically able to see his point whizzing past Anders. “Elves? You think I care what it means to pathetic-” He stops his tirade before it really launches, and takes a small but very deliberate sigh. “I can’t hide my ears. Or my hair.” Not that he’s even tried to, really. But having such an easy option at the mage’s disposal bugs him all the same.

Anders stops short at that, giving Fenris an intense stare. He gets the point, after that hastily aborted sentence, and it troubles him. It troubles him because it’s so familiar, and it’s not a kind of suffering he’d wish on anyone, least of all somebody he cares for. “You’re saying you wish you could pass for human.” Anders falls silent.

Fenris stops outright, looks back at Anders with another but more pointedly exasperated sigh. That’s the point he’s been trying to make this entire time, daft mage. How can he possibly need confirmation after it being spelled out so clearly. “/Yes./”

“And what would you do, if you could? What would it change?”

“What would it /not/ change?” Fenris finally calms a bit to a quiet, somewhat pained look. “I know you’re not this daft. Use your head and think.”

“Do you really even want the respect of people who would look down on you because of your race? Why care about the opinions of bigots and bullies?”

“Because it hinders me. Why would I possibly want to be associated with the grovelling dogs ‘free elves’ have become.” Fenris turns to keep walking, silently noting that it’s not much farther. “They’ve squandered their freedom.”

“And here I thought you didn’t know any of the elves in this city beyond Merrill and Orana. That’s a harsh judgment to pass on strangers, and a damned broad brush you paint with.”

Fenris snaps back with a growl, “Don’t criticize me, I’ve seen enough and you know it’s true. Those that aren’t are exceptions.”

Anders lunges forward as soon as they stand in the shadow of the mansion’s door. He braces his arms against the wall to either side of Fenris, blocking him in without a touch, and he kisses him, hard and insistent. “Fine.”

Fenris raises and digs his hands onto Anders’ flanks, holding himself steady even as he’s shoved against the wall, but not forcing the man away. Air escapes his lungs in a rush as he parts his lips, simply receptive to the unexpected onslaught until the kiss breaks and leaves him momentarily dazed. And confusion sets in, with a small knit of his brow. “Fine what.” Because that was a strange way to concede a point.

“Fine, if you feel that way. Just as long as you know that I love you as you are.” Anders sighs then and leans his forehead against Fenris’s for a moment. “No, that’ doesn’t really suffice. If you resent what you are that much… I wouldn’t wish that kind of pain on anyone, least of all you.” Anders straightens and backs away, his eyes lowered to the paving stones. He goes back over his words and finds them clumsy and inadequate, his comprehension slow and dull. What would Fenris even want with his sympathy?

Fenris is silent for a few moments, and when he finally starts to move again he steps out of the way and turns to open the door behind him so they can just drag themselves inside and be out of anything remotely public. “Go in already.” He just wants to be alone after that, though with a small inward comfort he realizes that feeling includes the mage, right now.

Anders obediently steps through the door and closes it softly. He leans his staff against the wall in its usual spot, then crosses the room to stir the hearth and get the fire burning high again.

Fenris follows, but slows to a stop and props his back against the wall near where Anders left his staff. He realizes as soon as he leans there that the staff alone leaves him uneasy, but he’s also too stubborn to give up his spot over an inanimate object. Instead he just distracts himself by watching Anders, a rare content look passing his expression until a thought occurs to him, and he barely manages to stifle a laugh into a strong chuckle. “At least we have a new doorstop.”

Anders looks up over his shoulder and grins at that, pulling the scarab out of his coat pocket and tossing it once on his palm. “What is this ridiculous thing, anyway? I mean, prior to its new career here in Kirkwall.”

Fenris’ chuckle cools to an oddly quirked smirk, flinching slightly as it’s bounced into the air. Can it even break? Likely not, but he wouldn’t want to be the one to test it. He shoves away from the wall but doesn’t get very far, just crashing onto the couch with his usual slouch forward, elbows on his knees. What, it was closer to the fire.  
And trying to explain the thing proves to be… difficult, so he just waves his hand at it. “Turn it on.”

Anders crouches on his heels, watching as Fenris executes a typically graceful couch-dive. "Very well,“ he says, looking down at the object in his palm and letting his magic flare subtly around it, feeling for that ‘catch’ he’d noticed before. The scarab seems to come alive, small delicate legs extruding from its brass carapace. It shifts its wing-casings in a lifelike flutter, showing hints of far more intricate workings tooled beneath, and then it settles on Anders’s palm. It turns in his hand, as if to look up at him with eyes that are nothing but brass hemispheres, and then turns over on his palm. It opens almost like a metal flower, plates and surfaces shifting to form a depression within almost like the cup of a tulip in bloom. And while the outer shell of the scarab shows signs of age, the perfectly smooth plates of this inner cup are polished and bright. Anders reaches in with his fingers, touching those smooth surfaces to find that they have slight give. They shift and roll a bit against his fingers, making the metal feel almost organic to the touch. "It’s a subtle thing,” he says in quiet admiration of its craftsmanship. “I still have no idea what it could be meant for, but I’ve seen puzzle boxes and fine clocks not half as intricate…”

There’s something amusing seeing someone who, for once, has no idea what this thing is used for. But it doesn’t help Fenris any in trying to explain it. His face falls to his palm as Anders touches it, cheeks going red. “In Tevinter, I-” No, no. He drops his hand as fast as he raised it, and busies himself with shedding his armor. “That living statue saved you a small fortune for a sex toy.”

Anders’s cheeks are instantly about as red as Fenris’s. He realizes where his fingers are and pulls them back immediately, his mind balking at the implications of being given an erotic toy by… that thing. But the Antiquarian had certainly seen it as more of a joke than anything else. “So you mean… this.. and then you put your…” Anders stammers, trying to decide if he’s nervous of the idea or curious. The tightening bulge in his trousers answers that for him, and he stands up, straightening his coat to try distract from his condition. “I’m going… I mean, mind if I…” Anders coughs into one fist and begins edging towards the stairs.

Fenris rolls to his feet and half-turns to the stairs with less hesitancy. “Alright, come on then.” He imagined as much would happen, and despite his earlier silent reluctance at the idea, now that it’s actually happening he finds himself oddly not minding it. But either way, he holds out a hand. “Give it here, before you hurt yourself.”

Anders nods and hands over the toy, freeing his hands to start unbuckling his coat on the way up the stairs. His eyes linger on Fenris, though, as yet again it dawns on him that his lover is calmer, easier, around him lately… and he’s extraordinarily fetching like this. He still blushes, but a look at Fenris’s face puts a smile back on Anders’s.

Fenris barely looks down at the object before sliding a couple fingers from his left hand into it. A history lesson on when these were invented wasn’t exactly on anyone’s mind when he saw them in Tevinter, but judging from the outer shell and where they got it from, it’s old. He’d rather risk a couple fingers instead of a dick to make sure everything’s in place, and momentarily focuses on nothing in particular as he feels the edges and places it against his memory. His hand sinks closer as his touch moves in careful, methodical strokes to check the panels, pressing too lightly to set it into motion, and pulling away to the edge before turning it and starting in again.  
As they top the stairs and pass the doorway to the bedroom, he offers it back. “Seems fine.”

Anders takes the Scarab and slides out of his coat, hanging it near the door. “So these… are they any good? No, I guess I’m about to find out. Why don’t the Formari make sex toys? The Circle could fill their coffers to bursting.” Anders laughs, but it’s clear he’s just trying to hide his nervousness as he undresses. And he keeps sneaking glances at Fenris in spite of himself. Seeing him so relaxed makes it feel, somehow, like he’s seeing the man for the first time all over again. Every moment he can be like this somehow confirms the weeks and months they’ve spent together, the work they’ve done in becoming close. It means as much as the ring on Fenris’s finger.

Fenris always seems the most relaxed when he’s alone, or at least that moment before realizing he’s not anymore. It’s really setting in, that Anders is a part of his life, becoming an extension to the point that alone doesn’t.. really mean /alone/ anymore, most times. Even surprisingly he feels less at ease without the mage at his side.  
He steps forward to close the space between them and reaches past Anders to close the door, yet somehow manages to avoid pressing their bodies together in the process. The wood swings shut on it’s own from the shove, and as the latch clicks into place he reaches up to undo the tie holding back Anders’ hair, an eyebrow raised in small confusion. “I managed to survive it, if you’re worried that it’s going to stab you.”

“No,” Anders answers. “You wouldn’t put something in my hand that was going to hurt me. Besides, you’d be as upset as I would if something were to happen to incapacitate my dick.” Anders pulls off his tunic then, and shakes out his hair as he pulls the tie loose. “It’s just… I haven’t… putting on a show for somebody isn’t something I’ve done before. And I …” He sighs and shakes his head. “I’m already embarrassing myself,” he admits. “Behold, the tattered remnants of my sense of shame,” he sighs again.

/Ah./ Fenris’ eyebrows both raise at the explanation, and he slips his hands to the freshly bare skin on Anders’ sides, the low curve just above his hipbones. “I’m not in the habit of being an audience.” Before the man can reply to that he presses their mouths together, as sudden and fierce as their first kiss, rough to force their lips apart. Just as quickly the grip at his sides tighten, lowering to firmly steer them both towards the bed. As soon as Fenris feels the small resistance of the mattress stopping the backs of Anders’ legs he breaks away, but only long enough to push the man back and follow.

Anders is as willing as their first kiss, as well. His lips open for Fenris, his arms wrap tight around him, and his nervousness is gone. He lies back, pulls himself back onto the bed, and with every motion and every arch of his spine that presses his skin to the body above him, he makes it clear to Fenris how eager the man under him is. He kicks off his boots, and after a shimmy of his hips his pants are down around his knees, but through it he offers kiss after panting, hungry kiss.

 

Fenris reaches between them, his palm flat against the back of Anders’ thick shaft. With a roll of his hips he presses the erection between his hand and his own, still left obvious and straining forward in his skinhugging pants. He breaks their kiss to watch the mage’s expression as he gives a slow thrust forward, bringing his hand up as he does, and back down to stroke the man harder between them.  
When he feels satisfied that Anders is hard enough he moves his legs aside, planting his hips to grind against the mattress in their frustration as he props an elbow to either side of Anders’ head, and leans in to kiss him again. Whenever he’s ready, then.

Anders raises his head for a moment as he takes the scarab cupped in his palm and fits it into place on the head of his cock. A careful squeeze and he can hear and feel the subtle click that locks it there, every articulated plate shifting and adjusting to hug the gentle curve of his glans. It’s smooth, and for the first time Anders notices that the metal is warm as well, but it’s when the toy activates that the organic feeling of the metal is most realized. It moves. He can’t describe even to himself the motion that it makes, a subtle squeeze, a complex swirling stroke over his tip, a catch and tease against the rim of his slit, everything happening at once. His eyes go wide. It moves again, and this time the pressure is smooth and supple, wet with his own precum. It’s different, chaotic, unpredictable. All he knows is that it’s sending even more blood rushing to his loins, focusing all his awareness wherever it teases him. And then, with a quiet insectile hum, the scarab capping his dick vibrates, and Anders’s head slams back against the mattress as he whimpers.

Fenris simply takes advantage of Anders’ reaction, and dips his chin to the newly exposed throat, to find the most sensitive place below the boundary of stubble there. It’s not something he hits on the first try, whether deliberately so or not, but it just makes him trail a few wandering kisses until he finds something that draws movement from the warm skin. When he does locate it his lips part, sucking and trying not to smile as he hears the familiar buzz kick in. Fenris lowers a hand again, this time without the help of his own hips that rock against the bed hard enough that it draws a small moan from his lips, and firmly encircles the remaining exposed shaft. It’s not excessively tight nor massaging, more interested in the heat and throb of Anders’ arousal even if he’s not actively a part of it.

“Fenris.. ah..” Anders moans the name without thinking, as if it’s become a synonym in his mind for unbelievable pleasure. The toy still teases at his tip while it vibrates, the subtle shifts focusing the vibrations wherever he’s most sensitive, and already Anders can feel his balls drawing up tight just below where Fenris grips him and his shaft swelling to its thickest. His hips roll with the tight, restrained motion of someone being coaxed to squirm from urgency more than intention. The vibrations stutter and stop, and start again, Anders moaning loudly in the brief lacuna as if utterly bereft and on the verge of begging in spite of himself. But then it starts again, stronger than before, and elicits a whispered “Oh, fuck” as Anders’s toes curl into the sheets.

Fenris’ hand sinks, the dip of his palm cupping over Anders’ straining balls and only leaving his fingertips on the shaft. His hand curves, squeezing, the heel of his hand rolling forward in a slow massage. A bit reluctantly he pries his lips from Anders’ neck and raises his head to find the mage’s, to completely press him against the bed and smother away his words.

It’s a fortunate thing that Fenris chooses that moment to give Anders a smothering kiss, because the mage nearly screams into Fenris’s mouth. That insistent vibration is a more relentless sensation than Anders is used to and before he even realizes the threshold is close, he’s past it, his whole body thrashing and bucking and surging up under Fenris. His sudden climax is cruelly sharp and shallow, intense but over quickly, and as soon as it passes, the toy is too much for him by far. Anders moves in a desperate scramble to unlatch it and push it away.

Fenris only lets up after he feels Anders’ orgasm subside, the frenzied throbbing at the base of his cock slowing, and props his weight against one elbow so he can get a better view of the mage’s opinion. Even after the bastard little machine is pulled off his hand stays, firmly glides up towards the tip. He’s careful, familiar with the overstimulated feeling as he plants the pad of his thumb over the slit. He only barely moves, sparing a rub on the hypersensitive skin when he wants to send another small spasm through the erection, coaxing it into milking itself.

Anders is looking at the inert scarab with wide, wary eyes while his hips continue to jerk against Fenris’s hand. But Fenris soon has all of his attention, Anders moaning sweetly as another series of slow, strong spasms has him coming until his shaft and Fenris’s hand are both coated in slick, warm jism. His eyes open again, dark and sated this time, as his breathing begins to steady once more. A small, inviting smile on his lips, Anders bends his knees, spreading his legs.

The elf doesn’t respond so easily. Even with the seemingly overt if silent invitation he stays put where he is, finally stops his hand when Anders’ climax is completely spent. “Well?” Does it stay a doorstop, or will he insist that it be hidden somewhere in the bedroom?

“It’s the most insidious thing I’ve ever seen,” Anders blurts, “And I think it scares me a bit. But I’m not sure that means I didn’t like it…”


	34. Chapter 34

As far as Fenris is concerned, Anders turns into a part of the bed whenever they fall asleep. They’ll both shuffle in the night, Fenris tending to roll overand curl up when he’s not splayed out from exhaustion, only for Anders to keep snuggling up to him until Fenris is cornered against the edge of the bed and simply gives up. Somehow they always manage to be back in the center when he wakes up, and when Anders isn’t breathing against him, air momentarily too hot and stuffy for the elf to stand, he wonders why he was struggling to get away at all.

 

But yesterday, after spending more time in bed than they had any business to be without being deathly sick, Anders had touched him and it didn’t spark the pain he’d almost been used to, nor did it make his muscles spring tight enough to ache and tremble. There was a deep wariness, but nothing more. They hadn’t completely let go for the rest of the day, which got interesting at dinner, and when night finally sunk into the mansion Fenris found himself not silently struggling away from the mage’s grasp. He’d remained awake for some time, assuming this would be some form of their first night where he simply didn’t sleep and eventually saw dawn cracking through the windows, but the next thing he knows dawn has just passed and he’s cracking his eyes open, just as the cat hops up and disturbs the mattress with a small bounce.

Knight Captain Mewins trots up the bed, apparently doing his best to make each tiny impact of his feet felt on the way, and then purrs at full volume into Anders’s ear. The mage has had a remarkably deep and restful sleep, his arm draped over Fenris and his body loosely curled up against the elf, and he opens his eyes readily, without the usual groggy grumble of irritation. The dark circles under them are fainter than usual by far, and the mage looks younger for it, his eyes wider and brighter. His fingertips skim along Fenris’s skin as he brings his hand up to fondly scratch the small cat’s head.

Fenris rolls onto his back, groggy but in a pleasant sort of way, which was also a new feeling. In Tevinter he didn’t have an option to have an opinion of it and he never did, with the Fog Warriors he was only wary enough to sleep when he passed out from exhaustion, and that habit had carried in his freedom to do so unless Hawke mentioned otherwise. Those times he’d grudgingly drag himself out of bed, faint resentment that if nothing else the mornings should be his.  
The morning and the mage. Fenris half rolls over onto his stomach, burying his nose against the pillow, debating going back to sleep before he cracks an eye open for the sole purpose of glaring at the cat. He had a sinking feeling it was trying to steal one of those two things from him, if not somehow both. “You realize that beast would eat your corpse, if it had the chance.”

 

“Only if he was all out of pulled Nug brisket and crumbs of cheese. Your point?” Mewins settles on the pillow between them, tucking his paws under and closing his eyes. Anders shifts as close as he’s able to without disturbing the cat, sliding a leg over Fenris’s hips.

Fenris just narrows his eyes as the cat settles, but doesn’t do anything about it. There’s nothing /to/ do, he’s fully aware this is how it’s going to be and he can’t exactly pick the animal up and toss it across the room. That would be terrible, even by his standards.  
Instead he buries his brow against the pillow, even as the cat props it’s back against his cheek. It’s soft, but that doesn’t mean he wants to hug it. “I’d rather something more loyal than that.” Though the only thing that comes to mind is a halla. At least they wouldn’t hop on your bed, as much as he doesn’t care for the trappings of the Dalish.

“Aah.” For a moment, Anders props himself up on one elbow and admires the adorableness of Fenris submitting to a cat snuggle. And then he concludes that he would like to be the one getting comfortable against Fenris. He gives Mewins a few leisurely pettings, then gently scoops him up and lets him down on the floor. By the time Mewins has hopped back up at the foot of the bed, Anders is half-draped over Fenris and snuggling up under the blankets. "Well. I won’t eat your corpse. How is that for starters?“

"I think you’ve done enough eating in your lifetime.” The fact that the cat is taken off the bed, even if only momentarily, and that he’s not the one doing it surprises Fenris more than he suspects it should. But it’s easy to ignore, when Anders is warm and heavy against his back, and he can’t imagine anything more comfortable than being half smothered. He stretches his arms forward, has to bend them at the elbows because of the wall in the way, and digs them into the pillow as he makes an effort to stretch his shoulderblades while not disturbing them, something he only somewhat succeeds at.

“Are you saying I’m heavy? Hmmf. Orana has been feeding us pretty well, perhaps I should restrain myself a little more.” Anders pulls himself onto Fenris’s back entirely when there are no complaints forthcoming. He shifts to get comfrotable, the pressure of his body like a heavy massage on Fenris’s muscles, and then he’s settled and content, his lips against the nape of Fenris’s neck and his hands resting on his shoulders. 

Fenris chuckles softly to himself, a low vibration in his chest under Anders. He situates his arms to cross them, and closes his eyes as he props his chin up. “I didn’t mean Orana’s cooking.”

“In/deed/?” Anders teases. "Are you implying that you don’t need to ever be eaten again and I should retire from the practice?“ When Fenris’s shoulders don’t bunch or flinch under his touch, Anders begins to knead them softly, warm, lazy thoughts filtering through his mind like motes in a sunbeam. "I think… today… I would love to treat you.”

“Just that you may be tired of it by the time I’m dead.” Fenris doesn’t flinch but his shoulders flex from the touch, not away but to spread the plates of his shoulderblades out of the way, exposing far too many knots between his shoulders he tends to just live with. But he doesn’t quite catch on to Anders’ meaning. “Mm?”

Anders rubs his chin against the nape of Fenris’s neck. "Maker’s breath you carry a lot of strain here… I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised.“ Anders murmurs breathily. He props himself up on his elbows and works over even more of Fenris’s shoulders and back, his fingers pressing, moving in slow circular patterns. He sneaks a glance at their bottle of oil and begins to smile. "If you don’t have anything to do this morning…”

Fenris sighs slowly, his back sinking against the mattress and loosening for Anders to really work against it. “Do I look like I have anything to do this morning?” Because even if he did, he wouldn’t do it. There was only one other time Anders really settled on top of him like this, and it had been just this comfortable when it had been cut short and ruined by yet another argument. As grouchy as he sounds, he’s in no mood to start anything, and he tips his head to rest the bridge of his nose against his wrists. “I may be able to lift it but that doesn’t make my sword lighter. You try swinging it around.”

Anders laughs a bit at that. “No thank you. I just thought I would demonstrate to you one of the benefits of being married to a healer. It does mean we’ll have to get out of bed, though – only for a moment.” He threads his fingers into Fenris’s hair and massages the very base of his skull with the balls of his thumbs. His choice of words in describing their relationship slips out unconsciously and unnoticed.

Fenris pauses at Anders’ touch midsentence, muscles relaxing against his palms until they simply stop. It’s a weighty word, laden with meanings he hadn’t considered. He knew what statement he was making putting on the ring, but there’s knowing and hearing it, the decision to be okay with it, to settle back in and /yes, I’m comfortable with the idea of publicly being connected to you/. He feels silently intimidated, but tries to push it aside in his mind, escape all the parts of him saying this is another bond tightening on him and focus on the simple truths that he would like to be here, like this, for the forseeable long future. “I’m not getting up, whatever you have in mind.”

“Very well,” Anders answers. “Then stay right there and don’t move..” Anders hesitates, though, and sighs at the realization that he, at least, is going to have to move, and he’s very comfortable where he is. He slides off of Fenris’s back, out from under the covers, and moves across the room to stoke the fire in the hearth until it’s burning high, and the crisp air in the room is perceptibly warmer.

 

That done, he pads back over to the bed, rubbing his arms and shivering slightly, and takes hold of the bedposts at the foot of the bed, lifts, and drags the bed over to the fireside. The noise sends Ser Mewins scrambling out the bedroom door. A few scoots, and Anders is satisfied that the bed is close enough to the fire to be warm, far enough that the covers aren’t going to be lit aflame, and set parallel to the hearth. He crosses the room again to the bedstand, this time returning with the bottle of oil in one hand. “If you need to piss, you might want to get that out of the way before I start,” he says, standing beside the bed with a casual tilt to his hips.

It was an easy enough request, and Fenris just takes a nap, his mind blissfully silent, until the bed lurches under him and drags across the floor with screeches only furniture makes. He looks up and nearly snaps at that, that he would’ve helped if he’d known Anders was going to rearrange the room, but goes silent before he starts, somehow… touched isn’t perhaps the best word but it’s the only one that comes to his mind, that the mage would drag the damn bed while he’s on top of it.  
Instead his brow settles against his wrists again and he simply watches Anders fetch the oil. As if he hadn’t been looking genuinely shocked a couple moments ago. “What part of ‘won’t move’ isn’t clear?”

“Just checking.” Anders climbs back onto the bed with a glint in his eye that can only be described as wolfish. It’s the look of a man prepared to indulge in something he’s not only craved, but planned for and worked for and intends to enjoy to the utmost. He pulls the covers off of Fenris and straddles his hips, resting his weight there while he pours the oil into his hands. It’s slightly cool, so he leans over to set the bottle on the hearth to get warm. And then, quickly rubbing his palms together to slicken his hands, he sets to work. He puts his hands just below Fenris’s shoulder blades and begins to knead the muscles there, just rolling the pressure of his weight from the heels of his hands to the palms and back again. “I have told you how I’m going to touch every inch of you, right?”

Fenris watches Anders through narrow eyes. It’s a suspicious look, but a lazy one and not only because he’s tired, but because he seems to trust the mage these days even when he’s being completely baffling. Had this been months ago he would’ve more likely entertained the thought that Anders was getting ready to put him on a spit and roll him into the fire.  
Instead his back tenses at the touch, and it’s less an immediate and painfully tight reaction and more simply confused at the sensation, but when Fenris slowly relaxes and just lets Anders’ palms sink into his muscles he sighs, deeply, as pressure leans against knots he’s simply ignored as long as he can remember. “You have now.” He mutters it, and even when he tries to make it sound irritated he can’t, not now.

Anders’s hands work their way up along Fenris’s spine, slowly and incrementally. He leans into the massage whenever he finds some tense, bunched muscle and he kneads until he can feel it slowly worked loose under his hands. The oil makes Andes’s lightly callused palms feel smooth. With a light touch, he brings forth some of his magic, letting it sink beneath the skin and into Fenris with soothing warmth. “I’ve had a lot of fantasies that started out like this,” Anders muses softly.

Fenris slowly lets his head slip from his wrists, relaxing too far to even prop it up, instead pressing his forehead into the pillow until there’s a small gap of cool air in the space under his collarbone. Even his crossed arms unfurl, loosen until a few of his fingers are lightly pressed against the headboard of the bed, bent at the knuckles with the smallest desperate pressure. Even without the oil easing the friction he’d want to just melt against the bed, and in a way it helps him distantly feel the details of Anders’ hands without the rougher spots. As much as he’d assume this focus would make him panic, send a spike of electricity down his spine and fire to his shoulders, one never comes. It’s enough that he nearly forgets how to talk, and for a moment the only thing that comes out is a slow groan from his chest. “/Started/? Please don’t tell me you intend to stop.”

“Not for a good couple of hours, no. I haven’t gotten /every inch/ of you yet.” Anders works his way up as high as Fenris’s trapezius and the base of his neck, massaging with his fingers and the balls of his thumbs as much as with his entire hand. “I waited for this,” he purrs. “And I’m not stopping until I’ve done a proper, thorough job.” He does pause, though, to reach for the oil again. After he checks its temperature against his hand, he pours some out along the valley of Fenris’s spine, and he begins to massage his way back down, over his shoulder blades toward the small of his back.

That sounds fair enough. A couple hours of this and Fenris has a feeling he’d just let the man do anything he wanted. Moreso than his shoulders, as Anders’ hands sink lower the tension in his muscles build up again, on edge as they reach the soft curves of his flanks, where the energy seems to be idling the most. So it seems there were multiple tiers to his issues, and being a mage was only one of them.  
And yet he barely notices it happening, simply used to it and distracted by the mage’s firm touch. “Nobody has done this for me, I doubt I’d be able to tell if it’s proper.”

“If you feel like a boneless puddle of the most contented goo there has ever been, that would mean success.” Anders furrows his brow a bit at the way Fenris grows tense again as his hands work lower. He massages slowly, with a bit more tenderness as his muscles here don’t seem so knotted – just uniformly tight. “Did I hurt you? You’re tensing up.” The balls of his thumb work slow circles just below the deepest dip of Fenris’s spine.

Fenris would shake his head if he could, but he finds that he doesn’t even have energy to. The description Anders gave is apt, the way he feels like ribbon wherever his muscle has been worked over. “It’s nothing.” At first the touch does hurt, a bit, and despite his best efforts it only coils his muscles tighter until he absolutely forces his sides to stop. It’s something he can do, not like his previous fears they’d had to work with. The only touch he’s ever imagined being there is something sharp, always aware of the most vulnerable sections whether he’s fighting or not, and having a touch lingering there is disconcerting.

Anders stops kneading, lightening his touch to just a caress and skimming his nails over Fenris’s skin. He traces light patterns over his back as he makes his way upwards again, massaging his trapezius and the thick muscles that cap his shoulders. “I’ll go back to it in a minute,” he murmurs. His voice is dreamily content, his eyes filled with the sight of Fenris’s lean back glistening under a sheen of oil, his ears filled with Fenris’s voice, Fenris’s sighs and quiet breathing, and the crackle of the fire. He /could/ do this all day. Even with his dick half-swollen and threatening with more, he’s too content with this to want to rush.

Everything between Fenris’ shoulders is hot and molten, completely loose. For all the elf could care Isabela’s watching just to see him glisten like she’d teased once. If Anders makes him feel like this, completely peaceful and for once forgetting everything, she could even charge admission. The thought makes him smirk, even if it’s hidden with his brow smashed into the bed. What drives him mad, though, is how much he wants to kiss Anders for this, and can’t without making him stop. So he distracts himself with the other thing that had been distantly on his mind. “Where did you learn to do this?”

“I found a book on Antivan massage that was making the rounds in the apprentice quarters… but that isn’t where I learned this. I tried out what I’d read on Karl and he laughed at me. And then he taught me how to do it right.” There’s a fond note in Anders’s voice, and a hint of amusement looking back on his younger self, remembering how crestfallen he’d been when he’d only managed to gouge Karl with his fingernails and earn a wince and an aggravated sigh. Anders begins to massage Fenris’s right arm with both hands, working his way from shoulder to palm, even gently working each individual finger as he reaches it.

“I imagine smuggling in books would have been one of the easier things to do in the Circle.” Fenris turns his head to one side, barely watching Anders out of the corner of one eye, that mossy green obscured by sleep-mussed strands of white hair. As much as he wouldn’t admit this either he feels a tiny spark of jealousy at that, the idea that Anders had something like this with someone else, at one time, when Danarius did no such thing. Not that Fenris would have wanted him to, and being jealous of Karl seemed completely unfair, but it ties his mind in small knots all the same. He’s not sure what he was expecting for an answer though, not sure if Anders had said some random extremely lucky whore, if that would have made it any better or worse.

“We managed to sneak books in all the time. They’d get confiscated by the Templars all the time in turn. It never meant any real trouble unless it was a heretical tract you got caught with.” Anders pauses for a moment and just rubs his thumb in the pit of Fenris’s palm before he lets his right arm rest and moves to the left, giving it the same careful, leisurely rubdown. “I’m glad I still remember this,” he murmurs. He can barely remember the last time he’d had this kind of leisurely closeness with a lover.

“Mm, I can’t imagine why.” Fenris can feel himself a dazed mess in his head, reality far too blurry and blissful for him to think too deeply about how he’s managed to get closer with Anders than anyone else. Very distantly it bothers him, though he’s not entirely sure how. He doesn’t want to be. For now, he just lets it drop, focuses on the tightness in his hand smoothing away, the oiled scars catching the light from the fire ever so faintly from the greater concentrations of lyrium there. “As long as you didn’t read about sex or blood magic, then.”

“Or both at the same time. I cracked open one of those when I was younger. The lure of the forbidden, I guess. Closed it three pages later and had nightmares for a week.” Anders is audibly disgusted by the memory of the obscene rite he’d read. "I don’t understand how warped a person would have to be to enjoy something so vile. I’ve never wanted to hurt a lover, or to force myself on anyone. I’ve fantasized about having done to me, but… it’s different when it’s all a daydream.“ Anders works his way back up Fenris’s arm and brushes his fingertips through his hair and along the backs of his ears. "I’m going to start along your back again, working lower,” he says. "If it gets to be too much, tell me and I’ll start on your legs instead.“

"Mm.” The small sound is the only thing Fenris can manage out for a moment, the tiny acknowledgement breathed out with a sigh. “Limits don’t matter with slaves, I’m afraid.” A tickling tingle travels down his neck as a finger traces over the edge of his ear, and it’s familiar again, and he’s bracing for more memories to hit him all at once. He’s not sure if he’s relieved or disappointed when none bubble to the surface beyond nights near a fireplace that he’d never lost in the first place and almost wished he had. At least they seem to be fading, as if Danarius was only a sharp image in his mind because he was still alive, but he wonders if he’ll never remember anything if he forgets everything in between.

“Is there never any moment, with the slave-holders, where they realize that regardless of status and what the law of the land will uphold, that they are dealing with a -person-? No hesitation, no twinge of guilt, no sympathy? Even many a Templar knows doubt, from time to time.” Anders begins massaging his way down Fenris’s back. taking his time about the neck and shoulders to further reinforce the work he’s done there coaxing the knots in his muscles loose.

Fenris huffs a silent chuckle, something about it subtly cruel and humorless, and in contrast his back remains completely calm as Anders’ hands work farther downward. “Any injustices you know are because you’ve never been there. No born slave strives for freedom any more than any mage thinks about it. I once overheard cooks counting themselves lucky, that they’d never been outside the Capitol’s walls and would never be the stock slavers dragged in for cheap meat.”

“Mages run from the circle all the time,” Anders softly corrects. "I’m not exc– Alright, I am exceptionally stupid, but not for that reason. And I know I’ve read about slave revolts in Tevinter… I just wonder if, even as there are surely some people who realize they’re being done wrong, that there must be some who realize they’re being cruel.“ Anders’s voice is quiet and sober. "Mind, I’m not saying it excuses them. Regret and reluctance are just feelings, it’s action that condemns or redeems.” His voice carries a soft, distant echo. "No one should have to suffer as a slave suffers. Whether they know they are suffering or not. Just as there are apprentices who volunteer to be made Tranquil. Just because they submit doesn’t make it right.“

Fenris slowly pulls his hands back in, crossing them loosely under his temple, but turning his eyes downward, focusing on the almost invisibly small fuzz of hair along the back of one arm. It somehow feels dark, realizing not just how differently he used to feel but how he defends it in his mind even now before he realizes, that it’s the way things are. "I remember news of a few of the riots. And I remember the impression that they were /stupid/.”

“It’s not the wisest course for somebody hoping to live a long and quiet life,” Anders acknowledges. "But for some of us, that never was an option.“ Anders’s hands move lower over the small of Fenris’s back, down to his hips. "We need to change the subject. I’m not going to be able to maintain this kind of gravitas once I get my hands on your ass.”

Fenris closes his eyes. “I don’t think you understand how thoroughly I meant it.” Not simply stupid if one intended to survive, but the notion itself, inherently stupid, the way magisters likely saw it before destroying them without overmuch effort the same way one destroys a herd of cows to save the others.  
But after a moment his mind finally wanders from his thoughts to actually hear what Anders is saying, and props his chest up as he looks over his shoulder. “You intend to massage my ass? I.. /No/.”

Anders is already working his thumbs against the muscles at the back of Fenris’s pelvis, below the very base of his spine and along the subtle dimples just above his rump. “Are you /sure/ about that? You sound awfully definitive for someone who didn’t intend to move this morning…” Anders’s oiled hands move lower then, cupping and squeezing, his hazel eyes locked on the sight of those perfect hemispheres yielding under the pressure of his fingers, if only barely. His dick registers his obvious interest, standing erect and producing a glistening droplet of precum. He manages to press and roll his hands over the joints of Fenris’s hips on his way down to his thighs, shifting back on the bed and then swinging one leg over Fenris, kneeling alongside him rather than over him.

Fenris drops his head back down almost immediately when it becomes obvious that Anders isn’t going to stop, hiding the hot flush on his cheeks though his dick twitches under him at the thought of the man just spreading him and doing anything he wants then and there. It takes a slow, dedicated inhale and sigh to even begin to clear his mind as Anders moves to be alongside him. Though he won’t look back up, when his ass is just so easily stared at right now. “Forcing you not to would just delay it.”

“That’s the spirit,” Anders says, his voice dripping with sarcasm. He doesn’t even pause, though, as his hands work from the outsides of Fenris’s thighs to their inner surfaces, fingers massaging him deeply but occasionally gifting him with a soft, teasing touch, a stroke along the crease below his buttocks or along the tender stretch of skin behind his balls, sensual without being overtly sexual. Even though he breathes through parted lips as a clear drop of arousal drips along his shaft, Anders quietly denies himself for now.

A gulp catches in Fenris’ throat, feels like the sound is all too awkwardly loud, his breathing too heavy, balls flushing too hot, though if he were honest with himself none of it would have been much of a change from a few minutes ago. Still propped up on his elbows and his head dropped between his shoulders his thighs spread, a small movement that could have just as easily been him shifting his weight, though it isn’t. Not when it’s directly after a brush from Anders’ fingertips.

While Anders takes notice of that subtle roll of Fenris’s hips against the bed, his only response is to gently run cupped palms over his ass down the backs of his legs. Then his massage continues, both hands kneading against Fenris’s left thigh with deep pressure, and then his right, from hip to knee and back again.

With no obvious response from the hands pressing along his legs Fenris carefully parts his lips and lets the air out of his lungs, breezing slowly over and tingling at his lips. The next inhale dries them, but he barely notices. “Did Karl make you wait when he was teaching you how to do this, or are you trying to torture me?”

“He did. And I thought you didn’t want me to stop.” Anders begins to make his way along Fenris’s calves, trying not to lick his lips in anticipation of finally reaching the elf’s high-arched feet. When he does, he shifts on the bed to draw Fenris’s foot comfortably into his lap, and begins to roll the pad of his thumb along the muscles and tendons in the sole. "If it helps, I promise to finish you in the manner of your choosing once I’m done. Consider it… time to plot?“

It’s not hard for Fenris to realize that he has no idea what he actually wants anymore. His immediate lust cools to a gentler if constant ache as Anders sinks lower to work out the tension in his feet, a different sort of strain that has less to do with knotted muscles and more the amount of stone his bones impact against every day. The pads are thicker, a bit more pronounced than a human’s, but still not as protective as boot soles would be. "I can’t think, much less plan. Just.. keep going.”

“I will, don’t worry.” Even Anders’s voice has a deliberately low, soft, soothing quality to it while he goes on working on Fenris’s feet. The pressure he applies is delicate, careful, and precise, and searching out not just areas of tension, but tender spots he expects to be sensitive to touch but rarely treated to any.

When Anders hits the curving arch of the foot in his hands, no matter how careful he is Fenris’ first response is to pull away a bit before settling again. It’s lazy, less pained and more catlike in his motion, simply never had anything other than his own hands and the ground touch his feet, much less that arch that’s usually covered by the protective and stiff stirrup on his leggings.  
And he’s noticing Anders is spending a little bit more time there, as blissful as it is. “What is it?” He’s not sure what he expects for an answer. If there’s some deep scar there it’s likely he wouldn’t even remember it, save the vaguest of marks marking through one ankle, perfectly between the bone and tendon without damaging either. But the mage should know that one.

Anders’s cheeks flush faintly. He feels self-conscious at having to stumble for an explanation for something he would’ve thought obvious. “Just… feet are more sensitive than I expected them to be. Something I rather enjoyed learning. I… thought it would give you pleasure.” Anders chews the inner surface of his bottom lip before he smiles. “You can roll over onto your back if you’d like me to move on.”

The elf seems satisfied enough with that answer. “As you wish. I was simply assuming another reason.” As mildly grouchy as he sounds he doesn’t move, if anything looks like he could sink into the bed and just melt away again. “Was it worth it, waiting so long?” Fenris can’t imagine it was, too much of him rough and tracks of scars tearing through his skin, but he can predict Anders saying otherwise. He’s never really sure whether to be flattered or tormented by the constant adoration and assurances, always left somewhere inbetween even if he instigates it.

“Yes…” Anders answers without hesitation, a note of dreamy satisfaction in his voice. “And it will take a while for the novelty to wear off, as well. You might have to humor me more than you’re accustomed.” There’s an implied apology in that. “You’re still welcome to tie me down if you get sick of my wandering hands, of course.”

“It’s fine.” Fenris is almost just as quick to respond, fast enough that he drops to silence and is suddenly grateful that he’s not facing the man. But as embarrassed as he is he does want it, wants Anders’ hands all over him, covering up Danarius’ touches and making his body remember these. “I’m not going to stop you for achieving what no one else has.”

At that, Anders leans over to place a kiss between Fenris’s shoulderblades, leaning his forehead there for a moment before he kneels up again. “It was your achievement more than mine, I think.” He doesn’t elaborate on that, though. He’s so accustomed to keeping his hands away from Fenris that he doesn’t realize at first the way his hands are planted on the bed, on either side of him. But this time, when the craving wells up in him to take Fenris into his arms and hold him, he realizes that he can. And slipping his arms under him, he does, carefully pulling, guiding him up into an embrace.

 

When Anders’ movements become less methodical, pulling him into a hug Fenris sits up easily then half turns to hook an arm around the his shoulders. For all that the mage has been patient Fenris isn’t, desperate as he pulls them closer, smothering their lips together but not perfectly as he makes a small gasp at his own movements.

Anders tilts his head to accommodate that sudden kiss, and presses into it. His hands glide and grip their way along Fenris’s back and sides, one hand finally slipping between them. He cups Fenris’s shaft and lifts his balls before his fingers wrap around him and start to pump him slowly. He shuts his eyes, all his awareness focused on the sound of Fenris’s breathing and the warmth he feels under his fingers and the pleasant ache in his chest.

Fenris shudders a small sound through his teeth, not quite a moan when it has no sound behind it, and he drapes his other arm over the tops of Anders’ shoulders for support as he rocks forward with his hips, his erection tightening and filling out in the mage’s hand until it gently curves upward, throat exposed and well defined. As quickly as the kiss starts it’s broken again, Fenris’ lips hot as he spreads a few short pecks on Anders’ neck and each one as needy and grateful as the last.

Anders strokes Fenris with easy, adept motions, his hand effortlessly plying on Fenris’s dick the same teases Anders is so used to using on his own. His fingertips work the loose tab of skin just below the head. On the upstroke he catches Fenris’s tip between the knuckles of his thumb and forefinger and pinches it tight, forcing it to swell further before he releases and swirls his thumb over the taut dome of the head. His own erection is achingly hard and he can feel his pulse aching in its veins, but it fades against the feeling of having Fenris in his arms and in his hands, kissing him and urgent for his release.

The kisses Fenris lands on Anders grow more rushed, mouth barely sealing over the stubbled skin before they search out a new place, until he finally stops with his tongue pressed forward, wet and panting before he pries his mouth off. Not that he goes far, half-nuzzled under Anders’ chin. “Do it.”

The throat Fenris’s lips are pressed against shudders as a hoarse moan slips past, and Anders lays Fenris down on his back. He reaches for the oil again, spilling it over them both in his haste to slick himself until he gleams in the firelight. He takes more time with Fenris, difficult as it is, his pulsing dick resting along the hinge of the elf’s thigh while his lubed fingers work the feverish pucker of his anus. Anders hair hangs loose around his flushed face, no clever plans veiled behind hazel eyes for now: nothing at all in his expression but love and want.

Fenris lays back obediently enough but props his shoulders up on his elbows, watching impatiently and more than a bit breathlessly, lips parted as he watches. His cock hangs in an arc over his stomach, the muscles loose but curled from his position, straddling Anders’ lap and balls leaning against the hilt of his shaft. He glances up, finally, quiet as he closes his lips long enough to gulp before his mouth goes too dry, then cracks a small smile from the corner of his lips. He rarely ever smiles unless they’re alone together, something he’s only comfortable with here as if it’s as intimate as their kisses.

That rare, sweet look on Fenris’s face makes Anders feel close to him in a way even their sex doesn’t. They’d begun making love to one another well before they’d learned to get past one anothers’ walls. But now they were here, like this, and everything felt like a dream to Anders, complete with a vague roiling fear in the back of his mind that he would wake from this, back into the cold grey of the last five years. But for now, this was a wonder, and when Fenris smiled that way it felt as if they were the closest of friends, and the deepest trust stood between them, that they were free with one another and this wasn’t work anymore, this wasn’t some struggle to drive home his point (hah!) or to find succor. This was play. This was nothing more than an expression of shared joy and shared cravings. He smiles back, gentle laughter in his eyes, his hand resting on the muscular curve of Fenris’s thigh for a moment. And then he’s guiding himself in, wonder on his face as his blunt tip stretches Fenris open and sinks past the muscle, into him.

The smile fades away but not for lack of caring, simply replaced by a small gape as Fenris sucks in a gasp for air, the oil making Anders slick enough that his ass only gives mild resistance before the head shoves past with a small pop. His head drops back to one side as he rolls his hips, sinking completely onto the man’s length, before he reaches up to press his hand between Anders’ shoulders and pull them into a kiss. It’s not particularly as fierce as he usually is but it’s not quiet either, a desperate clinging lust that’s only borne from wanting someone close.

Anders is breathless as he obliges, his open mouth sealed against Fenris’s, wet and warm. His tongue slides against the elf’s, flexing and curling against it, and his arms wrap tight around his back again, palms flat and fingers spread. The kiss muffles his moans as they start to move in tandem, the pleasure of each thrust feeling all the more intense for the time he waited. His body feels as hot as the fire beside them.

Fenris groans, his mouth splitting the kiss though not pulling away, sucking in air between them. His hips roll into a smooth but slow motion between them, pressing into Anders’ thrusts to shove them together. Reluctantly he drops his hand, fingertips slipping along skin before finally falling and reaching back to find one of Anders’ hands. He catches a wrist, pulling it free with his fingers before knotting their knuckles together, then pulls it forward to press his palm along the throbbing underside of the elf’s cock.

Anders wraps his hand around Fenris’s shaft, feeling his own cock nearly jump inside Fenris in response. He’s wanted to do this for… how long? His strokes come in time with the rocking of his hips, not so much deliberately but because it’s second nature to do so, his fingers tense and almost frantic from his own mounting tension. His moans and soft gasps are rising in tone, sweet, a more earnest praise than words alone could ever be.

Fenris’ thighs tighten, hugging at Anders’ sides as his toes curl involuntarily. He’s not quite there yet, but he can feel the beginnings of a slow building, that if they just keep at this he’ll burst sooner rather than later. The elf finally breaks their kiss, choking down another gasp of air, and drawing his chin down to watch the hand that isn’t his jerking him off, coaxing precum to bead and drip from his slit. "Don’t stop.” It’s an honest, small beg, quietly shared between them.

 

Anders follows that pleasure-glazed stare to where his hand is pumping Fenris’s shaft, his thumb and fingers skimming across his tip on each upstroke in a quick swirl. He nods to that plea, panting through swollen lips, and he doesn’t stop. His rolling thrusts slow but he keeps moving, keeps pressing his tip hard against that sweet spot inside Fenris and pushing past it, even though he can feel his climax coiled in his belly. "I love you,“ he whispers, "so much…”

Fenris shudders, deep in his chest, less something felt and more heard from the depths of his throat between the gasps of unashamed pleasure. The best response he can muster is an unintelligible sound, not quite a moan but a little better than a simple acknowledgement, and he drops his forehead to Anders’ lips, brow knitting under them from the delicious tension.

Anders feels a sudden pulse in his core and he knows that no matter how he tries to relax the tightening muscles in his body, he can’t resist any further. Fenris is molten hot, satin smooth and so splendidly tight. "I’m coming…“ He murmurs in Fenris’s ear. Then he gasps as pleasure overtakes him completely, his body quaking, but he doesn’t cease the rocking of his hips, however tense and staggered his rhythm becomes. He spills into Fenris in a warm rush, his thrusts becoming deep and smooth.

Fenris shivers as a chill goes down his spine, the thrusts against him grinding and thick, but even more than things he can pinpoint there’s something deep and visceral in him, taking the small cues of Anders’ orgasm and forcing Fenris into his own. As much as he draws his head up, the movement echoed by his arm as it draws up to cling to the tense shoulder above him, he doesn’t quite manage to kiss Anders, instead just panting between them, his lips curling into a small snarl as his eyes squeeze shut and his hips spasm with his climax, cum spurting across his stomach. The frustration cast over his brows turn upward, jaw simply dropping as the full effect of their sex washes over him.


	35. Chapter 35

Finally. It felt like forever, but the first book is finished.

 

Fenris had already started others, since it was hard to actually follow the plot of a book he was using to learn with, but there was some sense of accomplishment to truly close the aging dark leather cover. He’d intended to put it back to it’s rightful place, but once he stepped into the study it had become uneasily apparent that he had no clue where it’d go. In the end he sets it down, casually sitting on the top of a stack of other books Anders had piled on the desk that the elf had seen him pull from. There would be a silent victory when the man noticed the small book and the lack of any placeholder. Fenris wouldn’t even need to be there to see it.  
Though for some reason he decides to stay, as if to specifically spite the queasy feeling of lingering in a mage’s study alone, and picks out another book so he can settle into the chair at the desk.

Anders’s desk is a bit cluttered, but there’s a sense of organization to it as well. Whatever tomes he’s been studying are marked with strips of torn parchment. His notebook or journal or whatever he’s assigned to hold his scrawl, is on the desk but closed in a battered leather cover. There’s an old jar holding a number of used quills and pens, and the glass inkwell is mostly full at the moment. But among the various books of magic, herbcraft, and alchemy, there’s something that’s recognizably a small novella. Its binding is, even at a glance, cheap and chintzy compared to the other tomes. Also a bit off – one of the lower drawers, normally locked, is unlatched, by virtue of a corner of some rag sticking out at one side, preventing it from closing completely.

The problem with reading, even if he’s getting better at it, enough to understand most of the words at this point, gathers their meaning and flow well enough, is that it still goes horribly slow and his skill isn’t so effortless that it doesn’t sap his energy. Inevitably his mind wanders after an hour or two, and he sets the book down, with half a wonder to how the mage can possibly stay at this sort of thing for hours on end and sometimes nights.  
And he realizes he’s without a bookmark that’s both within reach and not being used.  
It all leads to poking about the desk; at first just an innocent pecking about, a couple fingers edging a book aside here or there, the one he’d started idle and open on the desk, and his hand lands on the one that’s unlike the others. It gives him pause, and he debates opening it, but doesn’t for now. He’s been sitting here too long for Anders to not walk in unexpectedly. So his search pans down to the drawers. It’s surprising that the mage has filled most of these spaces with the most useless things, and even more surprising that Fenris can recognize it’s his without obvious labels. Perhaps the lack of dust. His hand eventually touches cloth, and without thinking he pulls the metal handle.

The cloth is wrapped loosely around something cylindrical and somewhat heavy. It unrolls easily enough in Fenris’s hands and there, cradled in its folds, is a dick. The gently curved phallus appears to be polished, lacquered hardwood, gleaming and smooth. It’s attractive, as such things go, carved with care and detail.  
As for the mage himself, he pads down the steps barefoot, rubbing his newly-shaven chin, his hair still dripping from the bath.

Fenris stares blankly. The wood is heavier than it looks in his hand, the weight making his grip instinctively tighten and the only reason why he doesn’t immediately drop it outright. Then it takes all his willpower to not heave it across the room in hopes that it’ll splinter against the stone wall.  
Instead he unceremoniously drops it to the desk as he stands, the sound louder than he intended as the solid carving knocks against the hollow, lighter desk, and he becomes momentarily torn between finding the mage or escaping somewhere to his own thoughts.

A moment later the door swings open, the sound loud enough that even Anders’s human ears can hear it. “Fenris?” He calls as the door opens, before he can even see the elf. But then he does, and sees him having uncovered his toy. “…Looking for something?” There’s a bit of dry annoyance in his voice, at having his drawers rifled through.

The glare Fenris shoots right back is unchecked. Anders is there, and unknowingly blocking the door, and that’s enough to make him feel cornered, the agitation forcing his choice for him. “Should I not, if this is what you’re hiding!?”

Anders slowly goes from mild humiliation to perplexity. “It’s a dildo,” he states. “It’s not–” He cuts short quickly, shaking his head. This is one of those things explaining isn’t going to help with. He steps further into the room and shuts the door behind him. “It’s just a toy. Is that what you were looking for, then, or did you have any specific suspicions you want me to confirm or deny?”

“/I know what it is/.” Fenris apparently fights off the urge to throw the thing again but this time at Anders, and raises his hands as he physically removes himself from being near the desk by a few steps. He hisses words under his breath, practically snarling them as he pulls his thoughts together. “Did you intend to tell me that I’m not enough for you?”

Well. That’s clear enough. And for all that it hadn’t occurred to Anders before, it makes a sort of sense now, and he can almost taste the hurt and betrayal in Fenris’s tone. It settles into the pit of his stomach, queasy with guilt, and his face goes a shade paler for it.  
“That isn’t true. This is what I make do with when you have more important things to do than my ass.” He holds out a hand then. “Give it here, please.”

“More important things to do?” Fenris ignores the request, in no mood to touch it again much less hand it over. Anders can take it if he damn well pleases, and any sounds of guilt coming from him just seems to cement the anger against him. “You’re lying. What could possibly be more important to me that you seem to have it at the ready.”

“What would you rather, I just act as if you ought to be at my beck and call every time I get a rise on?” Anders storms over to the desk, picks up his plaything, and tosses it on the fireplace. He looks at Fenris, brows furrowed as he reaches for words. There’s a spark of defiance in his eyes but it gutters and extinguishes. He looks away, head lowered. “Have it your way,” he says in a low voice, his face burning with shame.

For a split moment Fenris’ eyes go wide, but once the initial shock of someone destroying something for him passes he looks away from it, good riddance, the heat of his anger quieter but still smoldering. “I was under the impression that’s the /entire point/, mage. You’d rather stick yourself with that then bother me? /Please/, bother me, I’d rather be inconvenienced.”

Anders makes a sound in his throat, almost a chuckle. “You say that now,” he scoffs. “Give it a couple days and it’ll be ‘You only want me for my dick’ and 'Are you never satisfied?’”

The words really light something behind the elf’s eyes. “Do you understand anything I’ve said? Is that all this is to you?” And silently, from the unexpected amount of injury in his gaze, if it’s all that their fucking is, something that would eventually become a bother. Fenris shakes his head before his mind wanders too far and drops it forward as he tries to leave, even if that means he has to get past Anders first.

“You’re just going to run away, then?” Anders takes a certain bitter vindication from being able to throw the elf’s own frequent accusation back in his face. “What I was trying to say, before I went and bollocksed it, is I don’t usually know in advance what’s going to get you angry at me. You can’t possibly believe I’d have… I mean, I wouldn’t have… if I knew it was going to hurt you like it did! I…” Anders stammers, snared in some uncomfortable place between confusion and embarrassment. “I don’t even know how to…” In the back of his mind, he can see Justice shaking his head at him. “I know I promised you everything, I didn’t realize you meant… every last drop.” He hangs his head, his face turning even redder. “If that is what you want, I…”

Fenris stops as he nearly passes Anders, as the mage finishes, turns with a brilliantly blue blaze and a flash of rage and reaches out but stops himself short again, palm spread across the man’s chest, thumb and forefinger splayed across the collar. The flare dies as he drops his head again, looking nearly as ashamed but less embarrassed, hand flattening farther along Anders’ front, straining to feel the heartbeat there. “That is.. not what I meant at all.”

“You could still have it, if you want it.” Anders says in a quiet voice, perhaps the closest he has ever come to sounding shy. His heart is pounding under Fenris’s palm. “There is nothing better than being with you. That something like that can be mine for the asking…”

The pads of Fenris’ fingers tighten, pull together enough for the tension, and the knuckles pressing forward until it’s enough force to push Anders back, and Fenris follows until they hit a wall of books. With it he looks up, less angry, but no less intense, green eyes unflinching behind the cold white hair. “Evidently. I don’t want to be something you’re comparing.”

“I’m not,” Anders says. He hears some of the books fall over in their shelf behind him, but he’s passive in Fenris’s grip. “I won’t say I never thought about you when I was… doing myself, but it’s… Having sex with you is about being with you and being yours. Masturbation is about having an orgasm so I can get back to work. Does that make any sense?”

 

“Stop patronizing me, I know what it means.” Fenris drops his head, eyes not completely obscured but turned away and unfocused, feeling frustrated but even moreso, defeated that his point isn’t coming across at all. “Nevermind.”

“Don’t you -dare-…” Anders grips Fenris by the shoulders and pulls him in. He leans down, lips grazing the corner of his jaw. “Why are you threatened over a piece of wood? When haven’t I been screaming and begging when you’ve been on me?”

Fenris flinches, muscles in his shoulders simultaneously piling and trying to shrink inward, but he doesn’t pull away or look up. “Dare what.” Only because it’s easier than answering the other questions, that he doesn’t want to be an option, even if it’s against something wooden and fake. There was no sharing attention, no matter how slight, before, only things done to him regardless of the meaning. And he wants it that way. But like everything else, there seems to be a disconnect about everything he thought he knew. Even this.

“Don’t you dare give up on me! If you’re angry I demand to be properly scolded, no matter how arbitrary! I want to be scathed and I want to apologize and I want to have apology sex!” Even Anders isn’t sure he can believe what’s coming out of his mouth. Yet for all the absurdity, the plea in his voice is completely earnest. “Please… the only thing worse than being scolded is being a disappointment.”

Fenris still hasn’t looked up, his shoulders hardly loosening though this time not simply because Anders is touching him. There’s some subtle hint, how he doesn’t change or get worse as the hands linger there, and probably wouldn’t still if Anders pulled away. “Then don’t ask why I feel threatened. It’s a simple object. But understand what I was.”

“But… that was why. I didn’t want to treat you like a slave. I didn’t want to demand things of you.” Anders’s hands slide gently down Fenris’s arms as they release him. “I have a feeling I got things horribly backwards, didn’t I.”

“Perhaps a bit.” Fenris feels like he really doesn’t know anymore, if he’s being approached incorrectly or if he’s being stubborn, the slave that’s so clearly still chained even if he’s escaped, and just continues. But then, it feels so obvious that’s what he is, and his shoulders fall.

“I’m sorry,” Anders says, sounding like he means it for all that he only half understands what he’s apologizing for. “I’ll… inconvenience you, from now on… and gladly.”

“Alright.” The rough grip shoving Anders against the books behind him goes slack, slips from his chest as gravity takes over and leaves it at Fenris’ side. Here he is again, destroying them because he doesn’t know how to properly exist. And he adds, lamely, “You’re not a disappointment.”

Anders reaches, tentative, to touch Fenris’s chin, to lift it. He smiles a gentle, reassuring, all-is-forgiven smile. And he notices the pleasant smell of cherrywood coming from the fire and bites down hard on his lower lip, trying unsuccessfully not to smile. “I can’t believe I’m burning a dildo and somehow Isabela is not involved in this turn of events.”

Fenris really isn’t in the mood but as he’s finally forced to glance at Anders the smile is infectious and the corner of his lips crack upward, just a little. Damn this man, that can make him happy no matter how temporary. “It was.. a ‘surprise’. Where do you find such a thing?” He can’t imagine trolling the markets here for one.

Anders glances sideways guiltily. “I asked the Madame at the Rose to hook me up. Turns out there’s a store down by the docks that’s happy to carve a 'custom chair leg’ for a handful of silver.” Anders quickly lunges in to steal a kiss, managing to catch the corner of Fenris’s mouth. “Was before I’d met you, actually, or even Hawke.”

Fenris stops there, all thought in his mind going blank. He barely notices the kiss, the small upturned corners widening into a bit of a smirk “..custom chair leg.”

Anders snickers a bit. “Hundreds of household uses, surely.”

“I’ll pay you back for it, if-” And suddenly it all seems so ridiculous, and it takes all of Fenris’ will to not burst out laughing, so he just stops there. His eyes wander to the fire, and pauses on it. “We could use your manifestos as kindling.” Since they’re burning things already.

“And once we run out we can put your lute in.” Anders says archly, a challenge in his voice until he sighs. “Oh, fine, burn some manifestos if it makes you happy. You’d better enjoy yourself, though.”

“Only once we can put in some of these books. Namely the heavy ones.” While looking for reading material it was relatively short work to disseminate which books would be illegible and useless, the large grandiose things that deserved to be dusty in a corner somewhere as far as the elf was concerned.

“Alright, but we have to toss in your– oh, wait, you don’t have any more things. This whole game is terribly unfair.” Anders pouts theatrically at Fenris.

The expression earns him a small chuckle. “Is it my fault you have too much?” It fades, though, and rather without warning Fenris drops his forehead to Anders’ chin. He closes his eyes and sighs, content but only at first, the feeling fading again to something darker the moment his mind sits still. “I’m sorry, I’m too broken for you.”

“We keep taking turns telling one another that,” Anders murmurs. A dip of his chin and he kisses Fenris’s hair, while he wraps his arms around him. “So I know you know how I feel. I love you. ”

“I know.” It’s a quiet confirmation. Fenris raises his hands, fingers stretched upward until they can glide along the man’s jaw and the hints of muscle and bone underneath his touch, and he barely adds any pressure to pull him into a kiss. It’s short, before Fenris breaks it, eyes still on Anders’ lips as he adds just as softly, “Sine te nihil est vita.”

Anders’ lips glisten from that kiss, and Fenris’s words bring a smile to them, a tender quirk at the corners of his mouth. “Ego ad te semper.”

Fenris puffs a silent chuckle at that, never quite used to someone else here speaking Arcanum so well but without also coming from Tevinter. It’s an odd disconnect that he muses on as his hands drop to idle along Anders’ neck. “You have such a way with words. We should really find a tree for it.”

Anders grins. "We can sneak down to the alienage and carve 'A plus Eff Four Evah’ in the side of the vehnadahl. With a heart around it of course. Thanks to you I think I can carve a pretty realistic one.“

“Thanks to me?” Fenris raises an eyebrow, debates pulling away from the embrace now that his mind is settling but finds he has no energy to. Anders is too inviting, in a subtle way, easy enough to keep a distance from but inescapable once this close. “I didn’t know you were paying attention.”

"I find I can’t keep my eyes off of you.” Anders is warm and calm with Fenris in his arms, and has his typical herbal smell on him, under the smell of soap from his bath. He also seems in no hurry to end this embrace, and what small adjustments he makes of his shoulders and the angle of his chin just serve to snuggle him closer.

“You’re mad then.” With a slow stretch Fenris moves his hands past Anders’ shoulders, props the heels of his palms against a shelf behind them and fingers pushing in a few dusted spines as he leans his body forward, arching into a kiss. “I wouldn’t watch so closely if I didn’t have to.”

“Maybe some day we can put all this bloody business behind us,” Anders murmurs, though he doesn’t sound as though he believes it himself. He brushes parted lips against Fenris’s, then seals their mouths against one another. His kiss is deep but unhurried.

There’s no protest save a quiet sigh, Fenris’ lips parting easily and letting them linger this time. As if they weren’t close enough he shifts his weight and practically tries to sink against the other warm body, elbows unlocking to rest more peacefully. It’s only when he can’t get any closer that he breaks them, if only to catch a small gasp of air. “Do you want to?”

“I wouldn’t mind spending more of our time like this,” Anders replies, this time sounding more invested in the idea. His hands roam over Fenris’s back, feeling the swells and dips of the muscles under his palms.


	36. Chapter 36

Anders is late to bed. He’s been grim and quiet for much of the day, his mind clearly on other things for the paltry moments he’s spent outside his study. But with midnight come and gone, his drive wears thin and he slumps upstairs. Justice isn’t grudging about it, tonight, as Anders seeks rest and respite. His presence is that of a patient friend, understanding and supportive.

 

Fenris would have, should have gone to pry the mage away from his work, or at least make a show of attempting to, but for the first time he’s been captured by a book. He had never truly understood the concept though he’d heard of it, and heard people describe it, but he didn’t realize it had happened until there he was: perched on the end of the bed in only his pants and sleeveless tunic, one knee drawn up to help prop the book, and Anders is coming in of his own accord and the room is dark, the only dim light coming from the fireplace coals. How it got this late, or early at this point, is beyond him, and he’s silently thankful at the mage coming in before dawn as he shuts the book and sets it down. “Finally bored of writing what nobody will read?”

“It is done,” Anders replies, a hollow echo in his voice. While in daylight the film of blue that roils, glowing, over the skin of his eyes would barely be visible, it’s far more stark in the dark of the room. He crouches down to stir the embers in the fireplace into a new, warm blaze, without a comment about Fenris reading in the dark.

Fenris watches Anders, gaze only turning away when the stoked fire flashes to life and looks momentarily blinding white in his vision, no matter how quick his eyes adjust to the new light coming into the room. “Then why are you still here, demon.” As antagonistic the nonquestion is there’s a hint of honest curiosity to it.

“Perhaps Anders is weary enough without having to weather your barbs, Fenris.” Justice’s voice is filled with stern severity as always, but there’s another note in it, something affectionately teasing, if challenging. He rises back to his feet, seeming taller than Anders if only because he stands with his head up and his shoulders square. And with his fade-blue eyes on Fenris, he begins to strip the clothing from Anders’s body.

It takes a moment for Fenris to notice the subtlties in Justice’s voice, unused to tones Anders doesn’t tend to use though it’s still his voice. He looks up at that, only to look down again to unlatch the line of closures down his front, because it’s late and that’s a damn good idea. “It hasn’t inspired you to walk him to bed before.”

Justice takes more care with Anders’s discarded clothing than Anders tends to, folding his coat, even taking a moment to touch the feathers with his palm. Everything he touches, he seems to take a moment to consider, sensing things only a spirit could. “I want this night with you.” Justice isn’t coy. “If you will have me.”

Fenris stops at that so completely, hands paused at the last closure, even feels his breath catch short in his throat at the statement before he can quickly compose himself and work off his pants. Even then, the best he can respond is a choked out and genuine, “Why?”

“To know closeness the way you mortals do. To know it directly, and not only through Anders. And… to be with you. To please you and feel the warmth of your body and breath…” Justice trails off, at a loss to explain why he’s so beguiled by this. It isn’t complicated. If anything it seems too simple for words. Justice steps closer, bending down, reaching out. “Do not fear me,” he says, his voice tender as his hands close on Fenris’s shoulders.

“I don’t.” The response is short, sure but wary at the same time, that Anders wouldn’t so easily let Justice use his body if he wasn’t in some level of agreement but still unsure of the demon’s motives. He doesn’t pull away, in any case, despite some immediate unease. “I’ve had enough of experiments involving my skin.” It’s a warning, though small.

Justice narrows his eyes, a bit of a dismissive snort and a curl of his lip. “That is not what this is,” he says. And then he leans in, and there’s nothing tentative, nothing hesitant, about his open mouth on Fenris’s lips. A tilt of his head and his tongue prods its way into the elf’s mouth, flexing as if straining to fill that warm place. His hands move along Fenris’s shoulders to cup the back of his head instead, keeping him close as Justice climbs onto the bed.

Fenris catches one shoulder, his grip tight but unsure of what it exactly wants, not quite clinging but not pushing Justice away, either. He also doesn’t pull away from the kiss, so oddly familiarly Anders but not that it catches his mind off guard, the one small hesitation keeping him there even when he comes to his senses. And, tentatively, he finally begins to return it, brows knitting as his lips pucker and seal them together more definitely.

Justice says nothing more, nothing beyond whispering Fenris’s name when their kiss breaks for a scant moment. His hands urge Fenris to lay back on the bed as he leans over him. As intense as his kisses are, his cock is still soft against the crest of Fenris’s hip. His skin is warm, but lacks the sensual fever of Anders when aroused. Yet from the note of craving when he whispered Fenris’s name in his ear, from the way his breath seems to tremble in his throat, the spirit is hardly dispassionate.

Fenris manages to drop his hands and work his shoulders back, elbows against the bed and holding them both up as he’s coaxed down in a quick attempt to shuffle his looser clothing out of the way. His are hardly treated with the same respect Anders’ clothing got, hastily pushed somewhere that doesn’t matter. With his chest bare he collapses the rest of the way, elbows slipping from their locked position and Fenris is flat on his back feeling more smothered than he tends to from Anders. He pulls his head to one side, breaks the kiss as he sucks in a deep breath of air, chest rising and pressing up against Justice. And he’s half hard under the confines of his pants, body reacting regardless of his cautious feelings, which is why confusion washes his face when he glances down between them for a split second. “What game are you playing at?”

“This is no game.” Justice’s voice is rougher, less of its hollow distance as he murmurs his hoarse reply. Then he follows Fenris’s gaze, annoyance etched in Anders’s features. The mage never seemed to have to do anything special to get that part to work the way he wanted it to. And try as he might, he couldn’t connect with it the way he would any of his other limbs. This part was obviously different. Confusion in his eyes, he raises his head, but Anders reaches out to him sleepily from within, whispering something gently wry and guiding threads of feeling to interweave with threads of physicality in a way Justice could barely fathom. It was intricate as a tapestry, and beautiful, and breathtaking, and of course Anders barely even saw any of this, because to him it was simple and obvious. Color rises in Anders/Justice’s face then, and the confusion in his eyes gives way to amazement as sensual, physical craving stirs in him for the first time. And, to his relief, it’s harmonious with the other cravings he’s already come to terms with. It completes them, in a way. “This… feels…” He cannot find the words. “This is new,” is the only explanation he can give, as his cock stirs and thickens between them.

“…Evidently.” But Fenris only hardly means it, looking more amused than anything at a demon fumbling at a body. It’s nothing like what he’s remembered, though the demons he came across in Tevinter hardly said anything, much less had a conversation with him. Well, there doesn’t seem to be a danger of Justice ever turning to lust, if this is how this is going to go. Fenris turns his attention back upwards at that point, trying to study Justice’s expression and coming up with not enough because he finds himself too distracted by Anders’ features. “But how? You don’t feel us every time…?”

“I feel… pleasure… but I lack the context to fully understand it when I am acting only as a passenger. It is usually Anders’ emotions I am most aware of… and they run high whenever you are with him.” Justice’s tone and expression turn tender at that, and he leans in just to breathe the smell of Fenris’s hair, lips against his jaw. “Touch me, Fenris. This is no game, to me.”

Fenris chuckles, a small awkward sound somewhat akin to a sound so long ago, when he’d just met Anders and Hawke and soonafter the rest, startled from the pit of his stomach and ended self consciously. “Perhaps not.” But perhaps easier a thing said then done, and when Fenris reaches down to cuff his palm around the exposed shaft between them, it’s a bit like meeting someone for the first time, yet already loaded with the knowledge of exactly how they want to be touched, which nuances matter more. He hooks his forefinger over the top of the length, just behind the gentle flare of the tip, and his thumb curls under, pad pressing into then rubbing along the throat.

Justice answers that touch by covering Fenris’s mouth in another kiss. There’s a slight, sensual moan, his eyes shut to let him focus on the feeling. It’s a pleasure that sets alight a yearning for more, and beckons his hips to roll forward against Fenris’s hip and his hand. He brings his hands to cup the back of Fenris’s head again, his fingertips dragging across his scalp while he holds Fenris to that kiss as if drinking him in.

The elf is caught breathless, not comfortably smothered but overwhelmingly so, enough to cause a tiny groan of protest. For the moment that he forgets his strength he just places a tight hand against Justice’s chest, but pushes a second later to break it and turn his head away as he gasps for air. He hasn’t completely backed down, palm still closed firmly around the stiffening erection above him, but his instincts are unavoidable, that if he’d stayed he would have been swallowed up and lost at some turbulent sea. “Forgive me. It’s.. strange.” He has no other word for it, but under the simple oddness of the situation is the barest hint of old recognition in his eyes, some vague memory cropping up.

Justice nods his head, this time bestowing a kiss on Fenris’s forehead, solemn and gentle and an impulse he’s certain must have been borrowed from Anders. His hands slip downward, under Fenris’s shoulders, pressing their bodies together with a purposeful, restrained strength. And then, he lowers his head, breathing in against the crook of Fenris’s neck, grazing at his collarbone with slack lips, and then lower again, his lips sealing around one small, tight nipple.

Fenris gasps, some small sound of surprise escaping with it as he arches his back, less away from Justice’s hands and more towards his lips. He had nearly glared at the kiss, somehow indignant and feeling a tad patronized coming from the demon instead of Anders, but had never really had a chance to lock their gazes, partly from their motion and partly from how confused it made him that he didn’t seem to mind it from the mage. But the thought is lost, amidst the rolling upward of his spine, ending with his feet pressing down to help press his hips upward, straining.

Justice answers with a slow grind of his hips. The crest of his pelvis bears down on Fenris’s hardon while Justice carefully closes his teeth against Fenris’s nipple and pinches, then tugs. His own erection swells full in Fenris’s hand, Justice reveling in the knowledge that Fenris is squirming with pleasure because of something he’s done. When he finally releases Fenris’s nipple, his tongue flicks over the hard nub before he switches his attentions to its twin.

Fenris looks down to watch, though briefly before closing his eyes and just enjoying the moment. Any hesitancy is beginning to clearly slip away, the chest under Justice’s attention rising and falling unsteadily, each making the small nips a tad sharper, and in turn peppering the elf’s breath with small fluttering gasps. His free hand joins the first as it slides down the shaft, makes a fist to press one side against the tip of the erection, holds it steady as he forces his hand onto it.

Justice growls in his throat at the strong stimulation, tugging Fenris’s nipple hard between his teeth and letting it go. His eyes seem dark and glassy under the glow that films them over, and his body has that feverish warmth that always accompanies Anders’s arousal. He’s been mesmerized by the mortal realm before, but tonight he feels swept up in a torrent of sensation, from the heat of skin against skin, the urgent thrill of Fenris’s hands on him, and the song of Lyrium in his ears and like a taste that hovers on his tongue. “More,” comes a hoarse whisper as he lunges, a hungry kiss pressed into the crook of Fenris’s neck, mouth sucking at the curving brands there. Justice’s entire body moves, hips and shoulders rolling in slow undulations.

Fenris groans as his chin lifts out of the way, his body shifting and unsettled, the entirety of him teased by the demon’s heat. His fist cups and tightly wraps the head as his other hand pulls up, and with the motion he lets the very tip crest past his penetrated fist, slit spread between fingers for a split second before his ringed grip falls back down the shaft and the head is covered again. This goes for a few strokes, each seemingly more needy and desperate than the last. “Then do something about it.”

Justice pumps his hips into Fenris’s grip, nearly panting, before latching a hand around the elf’s wrist and tugging it away from him. He pins it to the bed and gives a meaningful press before letting go. “Stay as you are. I will do the work.” He leans over Fenris as he reaches for the oil, and then shifts back again, rising onto his knees and taking hold of Fenris’s thighs to spread them wide apart.

Fenris doesn’t completely comply, but only in that he props himself up on his elbows once Justice pulls away, only to nearly choke as he finds himself so suddenly on display. The embarrassment turns his head away, hiding the color flooding his cheeks, but his erection certainly looks no less for it, still perfectly defined and gently throbbing under his smalls.

The sigh elicits a lustful sigh from Justice’s throat, and for a moment he indulges in the view, gazing down at those tented smalls while he runs his palms up Fenris’s inner thighs. His fingertips sneak under the hems of those black smallclothes, then curl them in his fist. One hard jerk of his shoulder, and the fabric tears, seams popping, and Justice tosses the dark, soft rag to the floor. His hands are on Fenris again immediately, stroking his lean thighs again, urging him to keep those lithe legs open, skimming over his scrotum and shaft. “Stay,” he repeats. The bottle of oil opens with a muted pop, and he pours it against the hinge of Fenris’s thigh, letting it run in a slow trickle to the crevasse of his ass. Justice watches that stream glisten in the firelight and groans under his breath.

Fenris jumps, a flinch running down his body and his stomach going flat with an exhale as his smalls are literally ripped from him and for a moment Justice hovering over him seems akin to trying to hold a wave back just before it crashes against the rocks, a force that would be ridiculous to fight against and yet somehow it’s being held back. And he stays, hair still obscuring his eyes and more importantly his cheeks, as his freshly exposed cock bobs in the open air from the cool oil drawing a glossy path between his legs. His slit is already moist, not quite dripping with precum just yet but close, the clear fluid welling up and threatening to flood the tip.

Justice brings his fingers to Fenris’s anus, catching some of the dripping oil and working it into that tense pucker. He isn’t certain where he finds the patience to take his time, but he strokes and stretches and thrusts his fingers into Fenris up to the knuckles, his eyes on the elf the entire time. He takes in the fall of his hair, the flush in his cheeks, his avoidance more shy than defiant. He wonders what it might take, what kind of teasing, to make Fenris as shameless as Anders, if only for a little while. The thought puts a tilted smile on his lips as he crooks his fingers inside Fenris and then slowly draws them out. Hitching one arm under Fenris’s knee, he scoots forward and lowers his hips. He guides himself in with his free hand, a puff of breath slipping through his lips as his tip begins to press into the ring of Fenris’s anus.

Even if a part of him is still obviously guarded, the side of him holding his decency and the side making him tip his head to one side, he still sucks in a deep breath as Justice impales him and holds it, teeth gritted just enough to be visible as his lips part. His hips rock to sink further, and when his ass presses firmly against Justice’s hips, balls nestling snugly into and parting his cheeks, Fenris cracks his held breath into the silent beginnings of lust. But he still stays put, either from obedience or self consciousness.

Justice’s eyes roll shut. His breath is hot and heavy against Fenris’s neck as for a moment, all he can do is feel.In the Fade, two spirits could intertwine and join and share of one another deeply. Justice had been no stranger to the practice even before he and Anders had coupled. Anders himself only suspected the truth – that in spiritual terms, his union with Justice was conjugal, sexual, an act of love-making that would last the rest of their shared life. But this was just as intimate, being buried to the hilt in the life and heat of another person, using his own body to bring them both pleasure. When he opens his eyes again he sees Fenris’s head turned, the elf’s familiar attempt to hide his blushing face behind his hair. He leans close to his ear. “Beloved,” he whispers. “Have no shame in this. You are more beautiful than you know.”

Fenris’ head turns at that, perhaps only because he knows if they’re this close then his face is still for the most part hidden. He’s not sure what’s there, what he’s so determined to hide, because the heat on his cheeks isn’t really what he’s embarrassed about so much as how vulnerable he’s feeling. It’s something uncomfortable but only if the demon outright sees it. “Don’t call me that.” The words are just as quiet as the ones that spurred them, the sound a mix of pleading and annoyance and even Fenris isn’t quite sure which one he feels more.

Justice gives Fenris a lingering kiss as he starts to move, his hips lifting and rolling in a slow wave of motion. He sucks hard on Fenris’s branded lower lip, and as he drags his tongue over the marks on his chin, breathes out in a shuddering sigh. “At last…” Justice whispers as he thrusts in harder, feeling his balls slap against Fenris’s rear. He brings one hand to Fenris’s hair, carding his fingers through it, then taking hold, gripping but not pulling.

Fenris raises his hips, moves them in clear response to the cock stretching him full and pressing heavy and obvious onto that spot that inspires a groan to his throat and precum to drip along his taut stomach. His eyes drift shut just as a sharper push from Justice’s hips rocks him, and he flinches, leaving a small wince across his features that linger before they go away. The unfinished sentence is a small pick that digs at him, not painful but enough to bother; part of him wants to be angry at this demon, driving Anders to the extremes he does, wants to part of him wants to make a sharply barbed response that will keep Justice to making his point already, but for all he intends the only thing that comes out is a distracted, “Mm?”

“Craved you for so long,” comes the reply, breathless and heavy with lust. Justice begins to find a rhythm, his thrusts deep, forceful, smooth. He groans deep in his throat. A shift of his hips, a press of his palms on Fenris. and he finds the angle to drive himself hard against that sweet spot inside Fenris. Once again his eyes roll shut as he grinds and starts to thrust again, the firm, fat tip of his cock nuzzling and battering at that subtle swell inside his lover, and every impact sending thrills of pleasure through each of them. His shoulders hunch as he sets to work in earnest, his attention, the power of his body focused in his rocking, bucking hips.

Fenris’ forehead drops forward and rests against Justice, the touch light enough and the desperate motions between them disturbing the contact. Another sound of pleasure tries to escape but it’s trapped, deep at the base of Fenris’ throat and interrupting his ragged breathing that fills his lungs in time with the thrusts sinking against him. His elbows feel weak, if that’s even possible, the bones and his shoulders beginning to ache and threaten to drop him back completely. "I know you can do more. If you’re going to mount me,“ He pauses, briefly, gulping across his throat, dry from his unsteady gasps, ”..mean it.“

 

Justice cups one hand under the back of Fenris’s neck while his other grips his thigh hard enough to bruise. He snarls, low and threatening, and his hips slam down against Fenris. His pace and his force become brutal, inhuman. He drives into Fenris again and again with enough force to take him even dry an unprepared. The bed creaks and groans under them, the headboard tapping and then slamming against the wall in a rapid beat. And the pleasure that builds in Justice screams for more. "Is this what you want? Have you craved this from me in secret, mortal?” For all the violent motion of his body, he isn’t short of breath. His voice is a husky whisper, filled with sensuality. “Just think how much you could have if you were not to proud to ask for it.”

A sparking shiver cascades down Fenris’ spine and the quiet sounds that had been simmering at the back of his throat come boiling up, jaw dropping and moaning, the sound deep and loud. Again his head lists to one side but this time less shy, the fall less purposeful and more simply going weak at the almost overwhelming friction between them, his cock thick and flushed and hot as it’s tip lightly slaps against his stomach. He can’t respond even if he wanted to, but reaches up and across Justice’s shoulders, clings for some small stability as he turns his head up again to plant their lips together, imperfect and his moans escaping past the small gaps.

Justice meets that kiss with an open mouth, his tongue probing hard at the soft space under Fenris’s, finding the lyrium brands extend even there. He slips one arm under Fenris’s shoulder and holds him tight, feeling the elf’s whole body jostle against it with every hammering thrust he makes. That weave of emotion and sensation within him begins to feel taut, singing like the strings of a harp, and Justice begins to learn each note. Aware of these connections in ways Anders can’t be, he realizes he can play this body like an instrument. He can tune every reaction. He can feel the urge to climax, but he can hold it bay, he realizes, for as long as he wishes. The thought makes him smile darkly. He thinks it will take a long time to get enough of these moans and gasps, and the taste of skin and lyrium.

The groans continue, though smaller and muffled as their lips shove together, as Justice’s tongue invades and smothers him and forces Fenris to breathe his small gasps of air trough his nose, his brows knit as tightly as his shut eyes. When he pulls his head away his lips are flushed, with a mix of sweat and saliva moistening them, and this time he forgets to look away, lips snarled with the aching pleasure battering against him. After a few more moments it becomes overwhelming, the movements threatening to drive him numb, and he reaches down to dig his fingers along the hipbone that might draw bruises tomorrow, too far gone to hold back his strength as he forces the movement slower. “..wait.”

Justice nods, his forehead brushing against Fenris’s, hair wild and damp with sweat. He stops, and the sudden deprivation shudders through him, making him groan. “What do you need?” comes a baritone murmur, but Justice’s hand already slips between them to grasp and pump Fenris’s shaft.

Fenris is left panting under the demon’s weight, grip loosening and thumb trailing along a hipbone, and before he can answer he moans too shamelessly at the touch on his neglected erection, and when he finally does he sounds as winded as if he’d been the one doing the work. “Just.. a break. Keep going.” Just, slower, and with a small rock of movement he sinks farther back onto Justice’s hips.

Justice begins to roll his hips, this time slow, sinuous, and smooth. He still hilts himself on every stroke into Fenris’s body, and draws himself out until the ridge of his cockhead tugs against Fenris’s rim. “Like this?” Just a soft whisper in his ear, nothing taunting or gloating in it.

Fenris’ lips part, his slow heavy breathing the only thing to speed up between them, a little shallower and halting as he looks down and shifts his hips to somewhere more comfortable. “Yes.” The hard fucking, now that it’s stopped, leaves his skin sensitive, and every slow grind, the way those rolling hips press up against him and then stretch him downward on the way out, every last inch of shaft that seems to go on forever when it’s oiled down enough .

“Do you want me to stroke more?” Justice whispers against Fenris’s ear, feeling like anything louder would break the unfamiliar bubble of intimacy between them. He goes on moving, rocking against Fenris’s haunches, letting those gasps and panting breaths instruct him, where to pause, where to press, where to shift the angle of his penetration to rub that spot just so. His hand slides along Fenris’s shaft, tugging on each upstroke, coaxing warm, wet nectar into his palm.

Fenris’ hips writhe more than they would if he was only being so completely fucked, somewhere between trying to meet Justice’s hips like a purposeful kiss each time they press together and hold for the barest moments, or the simple arching upward in his shallower ache to feel that strong palm around his shaft. Even smaller than his last words he adds, "..slow.“ and a quick, shaky nod.

Justice does as Fenris asks, and he pumps his cock with slow, firm strokes, each smoother than the last. The pleasure of each thrust into Fenris’s tight body sends a ripple through him that threatens to build and build. Even keeping that pleasure distant and restrained, Justice finally understands why Anders devotes so much of his time to daydreaming about this and other carnal acts. Not to mention why he has to take himself in hand when he lets those daydreams go too far. "Will you come for me?” Such a tender invitation, whispered against Fenris’s ear, punctuated with a nuzzle against his temple.

Fenris makes a small nod as he leans his head against Justice, not even having to consciously return the nuzzle from the gentle rocks shifting his body for him. “I’m so close..” The words are soft, vulnerable but rushed, and while his groans have quieted down to softer nothings barely passing his lips, while his expression relaxes and the tightness instead builds at his stomach, and it’s this slow fuck after the harsher pounding that threatens to topple him at any moment.

“That’s it..Let it come…” Justice swirls his thumb over Fenris’s tip, rocking against him at the same slow, steady pace, not forcing him over, nor teasing him at the brink. Just giving – giving just what Fenris wants, just as he wants it, unstinting and tender.

Fenris feels a small chill down his shoulders, knows it’s the beginning of the end as his abs grow tighter with the crest of each thrust, each time he can feel the ridged edge of Justice’s plump tip gently pull and lock against the tight ring of his ass before sliding back in, thick and long and Justice pressing flat against him before starting again. Finally, and there is a small relief even now, the coiling tingling in his stomach and balls tightened close to his shaft jerk with the first hard spasms of his climax, his cock flexing and squirting thick globs of cum onto Justice’s hand and across his chest.

When the first spasm coils and tugs at Justice’s cock, he cries out in surprise, his head dropping forward against Fenris’s shoulder. The pleasure in him feels searing hot and clamouringly insistent. He keeps it distant if only to witness it in awe, and he tames it in favor of savoring Fenris’s shudders of pleasure, his rolling thrusts still pressing, tugging, and plunging in deep.

If there is one time Fenris is so definitely not himself it’s when he’s in the middle of an orgasm, guard dropped even moreso than when he’s all too lightly sleeping, and completely lost in an emotion that doesn’t include traumatic resentment and paranoia. And his head drops back to settle against the bed, hair a complete mess and he doesn’t care where it lands or what Justice sees, too overwhelmingly comfortable as his climax is coaxed longer and he’s rocked gently to milking himself.

Justice gazes down to read the pleasure on Fenris’s face, taking in the sight of the flush on his dark skin, the downy mess of his silver hair, his sensual lips open and panting. He kisses his throat, long and warm, his own strokes slowing, his hand finally releasing Fenris’s shaft once its pulsing slows to a few heavy twitches. He neglects the surge and ebb of his own body’s pleasure, though, holding it back, keeping it steady, seeking balance against the frustrated urge in him and the unfamiliar ache in his balls.

The relaxed, satisfied warmth spreads and any remaining tensions flows from Fenris’ body like water, though he spares a last soft groan at the kisses down the exposed skin of his neck, hot touches mixing with what suddenly feels like cold air, the sound easy to escape with the rest when normally he’d stay quiet. With a heavy sigh he finally spares a look upward, eyes dazed but nevertheless a bit interested to watch a demon orgasm for the first time, and he manages to force himself up from the bed just far enough to plant a kiss at Justice’s bare shoulder, his lips slow and dragging.

Justice moans at that kiss, surprised and touched by that tender gesture. He still moves, hips rolling slow and careful against Fenris. That frustrated feeling threatens to eat away at his control – he can feel Anders sleepily stirring in the back of his mind, discomfited by that unfulfilled need even with Justice muting it for him. His brow is furrowed as if the intensity, the insistence of it, perplexes him. “I want to… Do you wish me to…” He thrusts a little harder, a little faster, and a thrill of pleasure instantly rewards him. 

Fenris blinks, taking a moment to regain himself and realize, and when he does he chuckles, the sound deep and no longer as soft as he starts to recover. Good to know, that he seems to have both an oblivious mage and a demon on his hands. They do so well together. He stretches a hand upward, palm grazing along the side of Justice’s cheek and fingers drawing farther up to knit through his hair, not tightening but just making sure he can lock his gaze onto those blue hazed eyes. “/Of course/, you bloody fool.”

Justice rides faster, not with the same brutal strength as before, but a desperate frenzy. His hold on that tangled skein of emotion and sensation that linked body and will released, the urge for more was far too much to resist. Now, he’s the vulnerable one, eyes wide as though startled by how high his pleasure rises, as though frightened of the pinacle. “Fenris…” And then his body jerks and shudders against him, his mouth open in a startled cry. His cock surges inside Fenris, his cream spilling into him in a warm wave.

Fenris sighs again, the breath slow as he bites his lip. A last faint sound accompanies it, barely louder than a whisper as his sex tries to stir again from the harder stimulation but can’t, yet leaves him aching his spine towards it either way. He hooks his arm high over the back of Justice’s neck, pulls them close but stops before their lips meet, their humid breath mixing in the air between them and Fenris finding himself not wanting to mute that cry.

Justice’s hips buck up against Fenris, tight jerks of motion that stagger and finally cease, and the body over Fenris sinks onto him, all its tension released. There are a few more sweet, bewildered moans as Justice is rocked by the waves of pleasure breaking over him, and then a sigh of utter satisfaction. The room feels like it’s spinning, and his body feels impossibly heavy and weightless at the same time.

Fenris pulls Justice the couple inches closer that it takes to press a small brush of a kiss to the edge of the demon’s bottom lip before he drops his head back. Lips still parted and breath slowly passing his barely closed teeth Fenris glances to one side, not particularly avoidant so much as looking at nothing in particular, only to glance back. “That’s what you wanted?”

“Yes…” comes the breathless reply. Justice’s arms wrap Fenris in a gentle hug, even that an effort with how languid his body feels. "Thank you.“

And with that Fenris’ brow knits, but more just the small movement and no hard lines detailing his face from it. "You’re strange, demon. Has anyone ever told you that?”

“I am not a demon,” Justice murmurs with a sleepy growl. He rolls to one side at last, still comfortably entangled with Fenris and making a small sound as his soft cock pulls free. "Niether do I fathom what is strange about wanting to make love to you.“

Fenris can’t help but a tiny smirk as he forces his elbows back and under, propping himself up but careful to not shift his hips or the slowly cooling mess across his front. "I’ve never seen another demon interested. Does it truly bother you? That I call you that.”

“Yes,” Justice answers, regarding Fenris with calm, albeit glowing eyes. "For all my failures and all my confusion, I am not malign. I hope to prove that to you in time.“

"I imagine you will be trying for a very long time, then. I have seen the madness you push him to. You can’t change my mind.”

“It is this world that is mad, not him.”

Fenris chuckles at that. “You say that because you don’t belong here. Everything is mad to you.”

Justice shakes his head sadly. "I have seen his memories. That anyone could stand by in the face of such suffering and cruelty… /that/ is mad.“

"So a mage’s discomfort is worth more than hundreds of slaves, then?”

Justice huffs a breath of air out of his nose in distaste. "You race to absurd conclusions. I cannot force you to see what is allready in front of you.“

"You’re a fool if you think freed mages won’t run to join a place where magic is embraced.”

“Not a one of the mages we have freed from the Gallows has gone to Tevinter, or wished to. If I am fool to think they did not lie, then so be it.”

“Not alone, too busy escaping to see anything ahead. Free them all, now, fear isn’t going to vanish with it. If they don’t join Tevinter they’ll make their own.”

“And you believe that makes their captivity acceptable.”

“I see no other option.” Fenris sighs, pointedly, as he glances away to glare at nothing in particular. “Enough. This isn’t going to get us anywhere and you know it.”

“Ah, then this is not one of your recreational arguments.” Justice speaks softly, but there’s a definite dryness to his tone.

Fenris turns his head to follow his eyes, gaze falling on the fire that’s threatening to die down again. “I liked you more when you weren’t patronizing me.”

Where Anders would likely insist on an ascerbic come-back, Justice is silent for a moment. He notices the chill in the air, and Fenris’s gaze turning to the dying fire. With a wave of a hand and a modest surge of magic, he revives it. "It is touching that you have any fondness for me at all.“ His words aren’t at all arch this time, but softly earnest.

The moment the fire flares Fenris’ eyes drop to the floor, partly instinct and partly tired of the topic of magic rolling in his mind, but given the choice of the two he reluctantly edges back to look at Justice’s eyes. "Am I supposed to do otherwise?”

“I do not know. I only know that I am grateful.” Justice’s hand drops again, and he rests his cheek against Fenris’s shoulder.

Fenris sighs, feeling a bit defeated, and when he quietly says “You’re a fool.” he really means himself. So he settles, at least for now, both not wanting to get up like he knows he’ll have to and not liking that he’s so hesitant for a demon.


	37. Chapter 37

When Anders opens his eyes in the morning, he immediately feels like it was a mistake to do so. His head hurts, the air in the room is cold, and for no reason he can immediately grasp, Fenris being content and asleep beside him annoys him. And then memories, not entirely his, filter through his thoughts. It makes him blush at first, his half-hardon rising easily, but something is strange about it. Something is … off. He should be happy that Fenris accepted Justice to such a degree, but instead he feels jealous. Pointlessly jealous. And then, his eyes on Fenris’s parted lips, he remembers something else. He remembers him /groaning out loud/ for Justice, in exactly the way he never had before. The flush in his cheeks burns from anger then, instead of lust, and Anders kicks the blankets back and rolls out of bed, hurrying to dress in the cold air. He needs to get out of here.

Fenris stirs when Anders does but is far slower to crack open his eyes. Parts of him are aching in a way he’s distinctly familiar with, and as Anders gets out of bed he rolls over for a moment before forcing himself awake and to sit up, the motion a bodily effort. That’s when he notices the mage’s rush, is practically less drowsy just watching the man, and idly wonders if a nightmare got to him again. “What is it?”

“It’s bloody freezing in here,” Anders snaps. "Go back to sleep, I’m sure you want to.“ He fastens his trousers and starts pulling his tunic on over his head, realizing in the process that he should probably run a comb through his hair.

Fenris straightens, not completely unused to being snapped at first thing in the morning, either. Or snapping. He stretches, or tries to as much as he can without his body complaining, and tries to give Anders the benefit of the doubt for ruining his morning. "Anders, what are you doing?”

“Going out.” Anders shoves his hands through his hair a couple of times before pulling it back in the usual fashion, and then he reaches for his coat. "Stop being a contrary bastard and go back to sleep. I’ll see you later.“

"No, you won’t.” Fenris drags himself out of bed, slower to the point but finding his clothes, only to stop and prop his palms back against the small table by the bed when he realizes he’ll have to pick through the mansion’s remaining servants’ clothing for anything that isn’t.. well, shredded the way his smalls are.

“Won’t I? Shall I grab my books, then?” Anders pulls his coat on, shoving his arms into the sleeves and then giving Fenris a defiant glare. He’s being horrible and he knows it, yet the anger in him won’t die down, and bitterness sits like bile in the back of his throat. He looks down and realizes Fenris’s usual smalls are missing. He immediately remembers why, and it makes him glower. "I’ll be back. Even if I didn’t want to, Justice would drag me in.“

There’s a sharp swell of emotions, less that Anders is angry about something and more that he seems to think Fenris will just wait around the mansion for him to nebulously ‘come back’. He knows waiting and he isn’t going to start it again now. And he’s naked, and the room is colder than comfortable, but it doesn’t matter. "Did you give me this ring just so you can threaten it?”

That does give Anders pause, though he’s clearly still smoldering in anger over something. His glare drops to the floor, ending up fixed on where Fenris’s torn smalls landed. "No,“ he says firmly. "So, when were you going to tell me Justice was better?”

That was the last thing Fenris expected out of his mouth, and one of his eyebrows just lifts blankly before the other joins it. “That’s what..” He drops a palm from the edge of the table he’s leaning against, to wave it at Anders. “- all /this/ is about? You think, that I think, that he was better.”

“Oh of course, I’m being completely unreasonable, you only moaned out loud for him like you never do when you’re with me! 'Mount me like you mean it,’ is that what you said? And then you were practically screaming, panting, head thrown back like a… like a… like you were having the best lay you’d ever been given and it wasn’t from me!” Anders goes from furious to utterly torn as he raves. "I wanted to do that to you! I wanted to have you that way! You’re… supposed to be /mine/…“ Even in his mind he can hear a quiet, frustrated rumble of *Anders, you fool.*

Fenris doesn’t look incredibly impressed by any of it, though he goes quiet, very keenly aware of the small weight on his hand, the words Anders just barely didn’t say."Nevermind. You should go.” Fenris almost absently pulls the ring off his finger, the only thing remotely clothing left on him, and rolls it in his palm as he looks away.

“Now you want me gone,” Anders says, crestfallen. Now Fenris wants him to go and he’s afraid to leave. "If that is what you want,“ he says reluctantly, and he turns for the door. "I’m sorry.”

“Sorry you nearly called me a whore? Get out.”

“That isn’t what I was going to say! If you throw me out let it be over something I actually did.” Anders turns again to lean against the door, his arms crossed over his chest.

“'Like a’ what, then!? Like a slave with a master that lets a demon have him, perhaps.”

“Like something so incredibly beautiful and passionate and unbridled that I was sure there was a good metaphor in there somewhere and then I couldn’t think of a single bloody thing that even comes close!”

Fenris pauses, then sighs, heavily, and his free hand not rolling a ring around finds his face, but he drops it away just as quickly to reach for his pants and shove them on. Smalls be damned. “Sit.”

“Sit” is definitely a step up from “get out,” so Anders returns to the bed and takes a seat, arms resting on his knees and hands meekly folded.

Fenris is quiet for another moment, though he feels his bitter anger blowing away once Anders sits down and is left looking somewhat pathetic. With a little hesitance he steps forward to close the distance between them, and falls into an exhausted sit at Anders’ side. “You’re still a bloody idiot.”

“Yes, yes I am.” Anders ventures as far as to glance over to his side when he feels the bed sink as Fenris reseats himself, grateful that the elf is still there. That he’s still there. "I’m a fool and I am really, terribly sorry.“ He says it as much to Justice as to Fenris, though he can tell that the spirit was never so much angry as exasperated with him. Justice had a terrible temper, but the things that roused it were very particular.

Fenris lets it hang like that for a moment, tries to bring his mind back together, hooks his pointer finger through the loop of the ring to spin it with his thumb. "Have you ever been fucked by a demon, mage?” He suspects he knows the answer, but just to make a point he asks anyway.

Anders nearly chokes. "…No. Is there something I should know about it?“

"Clearly.” Fenris nearly leaves it at that, that and a glare that practically reads /then don’t criticize me/, but he shoves the ring back onto his finger just so he can prop his head against his palm. “They tend to hold back.” If they want you to like it, anyway.

“I’m sorry. I’m… I’m so jealous I can taste it. I wish I could make you feel that way. And I didn’t expect to be out-fucked by a fade spirit.” Anders sighs. “This is all just wounded vanity on my part. I’m sorry for making you weather that. ”

Fenris looks up out of the corner of one eye, then picks his head up to give Anders a flatly quizzical look. “Why do you keep insisting he was better? Because I was loud..? Is that all?”

Anders considers for a moment before he nods. “It was…” The flush in his cheeks makes his point for him as he trails off. “…everything I remember about last night was amazing. I should be congratulating Justice on a job well done, not pitying myself and throwing a tantrum.”

“/Shut up./ Are you not getting the point I’m trying to make?”

“That I’m being tremendously stupid? That goes without saying.”

“I never said he was better.”

“You never said he wasn’t.” Anders knows it’s a lame retort, but he says it anyway. Justice, crowding the forefront of his mind more than he typically does, regales him with fragments of memory. *When has he not enjoyed you, you ridiculous mortal?* “I really am a fool…”

“You are, and he’s not. I..” Fenris drops his head back to his palm, brushes his fingers through his hair as he looks away. “I’m quiet because it means more.”

After a moment, there’s a light pressure on Fenris’s shoulder as Anders rests his forehead there. He closes his eyes, moved by that answer, that shyness Fenris has. “It means the world to me,” he says quietly.

Fenris turns his head back with a start, only to sigh in exasperation. “It didn’t a moment ago. Is he only a part of you when it’s convenient?”

“What do you mean? What have I done now?”

“I don’t pretend to understand, mage. But this entire morning has sounded like you’re jealous of yourself.”

Anders feels his cheeks turning pink with shame. He lifts his head and coughs into his fist. “Well. When you put it that way…” Finally he groans, falls to the bed, and pulls a pillow over his head in utter mortification.

Fenris watches over his shoulder but then follows to stretch out at Anders’ side. It’s cold, which is a good excuse but it makes him sink closer all the same. Still, he shivers, with nothing but pants on, and waves a hand over his shoulder. “Make yourself useful, do the fire trick again. If you’re not leaving.”

Anders peeks out from the pillow, raises a hand, and coaxes the embers in the fireplace back to life. “It won’t last unless I put a few more logs on it in an hour or two, but it will be warmer by then.” Anders pulls his arm out of his coatsleeve and pulls his coat over Fenris’s bare shoulder, then tugs the blankets up over them both.

Fenris hardly hears those words, too busy settling in closer and props his forehead against the nearest shoulder he can plant it against. And he has a small glare for the coat, though he does nothing about it, and at least it’s been through so much that there’s nothing remotely about it’s smell that reminds him of anything, save dirt. And Anders. With a sudden realization he rolls onto his back, and arches his hips to work off his pants once more. “The next time you get angry, don’t try to leave.”

“I… alright.” Anders rests his face against the back of Fenris’s neck and shuts his eyes. Between the elf’s soft hair and the warm blankets, he feels sheltered and secure. “I wanted to avoid saying anything stupid. We see how well that worked.” He drapes an arm over Fenris’s middle when he settles into their snuggle again. 

“Mm. You always run.” Fenris finally finishes peeling back out of his pants, tosses them unceremoniously to one side, then turns around to catch Anders’ lips with his. It really is nothing like the night before, and he leans into it to seal their lips together, slow and careful and trying to show exactly what he meant with his explanation he barely choked out.

There’s a small sound in Anders’s throat as he sinks into that kiss. How could he ever doubt this? Was he that afraid it was all a dream he’d wake up from? He lets that kiss linger, answering it with tenderness and contrition. “You make me want to stop running… and you make me realize I barely know how. I am so sorry.”

“Stop apologizing.” The words are gentle, though, hardly insistent. Fenris is too tired to be so bothersome.“Now you have last night, as well. Enjoy it, if it’s what you want to hear so much.”

“Mostly, I want to please you. I want to please you in every way you could ever crave and several you can’t even imagine. I want to see your smile and know there turned out to be some use for me in this world after all.”


	38. Chapter 38

It had been a hard day, to say the least. Fenris never had any illusions that one of them wouldn’t die, sooner or later, under Hawke’s lead. Throwing themselves into fights was anything but low key. But this was.. unexpected, and Hawke’s mother asked for that end no more than the experimented slaves in Tevinter had, and Fenris had been silent, let Hawke take her body away with Isabela before the rest of them solemnly dispersed. He would maybe say something, but now was not the time nor did he have the words, though he feared nothing he would ever say would be sufficient.  
But on a complete whim, Fenris had passed their mansion, Anders in tow, and barely said a word until they were out of the city and heading down the path that would eventually level out to the Wounded Coast. It was a cloudy, almost uncomfortably cold day, but the scenery is the last thing on his mind.  
“I hope you understand, now.”

It had been a horror to witness, and Anders had felt chilled to the bone even before they had left the shelter of the city walls. Sympathy for Hawke still lodged deep in him somewhere, and Justice was stricken alike. Justice wanted the world to be fair, to make sense. And what had happened to Leandra Hawke had been nothing but madness. The blood mage Quentin’s self-justifications – for love, for knowledge, for power – had rung hollow to Anders. He had seen good mages driven to terrible deeds, but this was nothing of the sort. This was the act of a man who would have done horrible things no matter what means were given to him. There was nothing of love in what he had done to Leandra and the other women. And as for power? Who in their right mind would even want to do what he had done?  
When Fenris speaks, Anders hears the thrum of his voice well before he pieces the words together. At first it’s a comforting reminder that he isn’t alone. And then comprehension rushes in, and that brief second of warmth makes the cold even more biting.  
“/What?/” The look on his face as he turns to Fenris is one of incredulous disgust.

Fenris barely casts more than a glance out of the corner of his eye in Anders’ direction, and he doesn’t so much as lose a step at the response, at least not when they’re both this obvious and directly on the path, when anyone could try to jump them. It wouldn’t work, but he was in no mood all the same. “You still don’t see a reason for the circle? After that?” But he does come to a halt, then, the worn in dirt hard but damp under his feet, and for some reason he only noticed it now as he sees the look on Anders’ face and really lets it’s meaning sink in. “Are you mad?”

“You’re serious.” Anders still has incredulity in his voice, but it’s fading in the wake of outrage. “You’d tar us all with the same brush as that homicidal madman. Of course. One mage commits a crime, all mages take the blame. With the whole of society on your side, why should you think any different. What do you even know about the Circle? They have one of the strictest in Thedas here in Kirkwall but that still didn’t prevent Quentin from running amok. So how did the Circle justify it’s necessity, in this horror? The Circle did nothing, the Templars did nothing. It fell to Hawke to try and save Leandra’s life.”

“So making an attempt means nothing? Yes, the Circle needs to be changed.” Fenris half turns, clearly torn between just dropping it and continuing, or not, and either way he’s agitated and not just from the argument. Little mystery why. He doesn’t make it past a first step before shooting a glare back again, trying to hold back a gathering rage. “So nobody should protect everyone else from… /that/? Or even try to?”

“I’m saying the Circle is not the way to protect anyone. And I’m saying the persecution and imprisonment of innocents is -also- wrong.” Anders’s anger, for now, is a cold and level thing, tempered strongly by Justice and by the endless times he’s walked down this road of reasoning in his own mind. “I ask you again, do you even know what the Circle is? Do you know what happens there? It’s a bloody charnel house!!” Anders clenches his fists hard, the last few words coming out as a furious snarl.

Fenris waves a hand to the landscape nearby, his voice erupting to the full force that had been boiling in his chest ever since they left Hawke. “And the Bone Pit isn’t!? What happens in Tevinter was handed to you and you /still don’t get it!/ How many more people, mage. How many more slaves does Tevinter need to take before you’re satisfied that /something/ has to be done.”

“Why do you keep insisting that it’s either thus or thus, Tevinter or the Circle?! Why is it in your world, either mundanes are slaves, or mages are?! You’ve suffered all that you have and you’re honestly fine with that suffering still being at large in the world, as long as it’s happening to people who are -different from you-? I’ve seen the Bone Pit, yes! Now I ask you, have you ever seen a graveyard by the gallows? Or anywhere near any Circle tower? No, you haven’t, and if you went to look you wouldn’t find one. Since it’s obvious that mages do die, figure why that is. Take a moment, think. We’re buried in unmarked graves, and often in mass graves. If I’d been able to climb up to the only window in my cell in Kinloch, I would’ve had a fine view of the mass grave where they’d interred the dead after the last Annulment! So is that what it comes down to, to you? Better me than you, better us than your kind? And that if I would just accept that everything that happened to me was for a -good reason- you think it would make it all better?!”

Fenris raises a hand in his frustration, armor sharp and still stained with deep red marks of the day, before it closes to a tight fist and drops, as he looks away. “I don’t agree with it. But there is no other option. And if there’s no Circle, then? Who stops one mage from doing this, or two from destroying a town? So few can change so much. I don’t think it fair, but you’re blinded in your rush to free them all.”

“You argue awfully hard in favor of something you think unfair.” Anders narrows his eyes. “And freeing the mages doesn’t require dismantling the city guard, the standing armies of various nations, or even the Templar order. All I call for is an end to the Circles. The Templars can police mages who -actually- do wrong, same as any criminal is policed. As it is, every one of us is treated as if we’re just waiting for an opportunity to become Quentin.” Anders nearly spits the name, tasting bile in his throat. “If you think the Circle is such a necessity, why haven’t you given me to the Templars? Wouldn’t that be your duty? Aren’t you putting innocent lives at risk by harboring a dangerous apostate?”

Fenris snarls, the main point of the argument momentarily lost as Anders’ words hit too close, and he reaches forward to catch the mage’s arm and force them closer, roughly. “Don’t ask me that question, mage. Not when you fully know the answer. Then how many would protect their families, or mages protect each other, only to not be as ready if their decision becomes a mistake?”

“Do I?” Anders submits to Fenris’s forcefulness without resistance, but there’s steel in his eyes and in his voice. “Is it because you’re here to put me down when I inevitably go on a rampage, drunk with my own power? Is that how you think of me, after this long – just a loose canon you’re unfortunate enough to be fond of? You -know- me! You know me and you think of me as a menace? Give me a bloody answer!”

“NO!” Fenris immediately averts his eyes at his outburst, for all that it hides nothing in their proximity, and just as quickly quiets down to something just above a whisper. “But I can afford that risk, if I’m wrong.”

Anders is mollified. He had been so ready to hear Fenris confirm that, some part of him stubbornly expecting everything to go up in smoke. He bows his head, eyes sad, looking ashamed and crestfallen. “Forgive me. I should know better myself, by now.”

“Though you’re certainly obnoxious enough that I wish you were, sometimes.” Fenris abruptly moves without warning, pulls Anders into a fleeting but rough kiss, any remaining rage draining with their lips jammed between their teeth before he lightly shoves the mage away, gaze still set downwards.

Anders sighs heavily, cold wind whipping his hair free of it’s small tie. He leans forward, resting his forehead on Fenris’s shoulder. “I believe the innocent shouldn’t be punished. I believe that suffering creates more madmen than it subdues. And I’ve fought against mages who would abuse their power just as often as I’ve fought against Templars. And yet I still believe in this, because of what I’ve seen. I only beg you not to hate me for it.” He shuts his eyes tight, the upwelling of anguish in him taking him by surprise. “I would never stand by and let anyone suffer as you have. Please believe me.”

Fenris narrows his eyes, but doesn’t pull away for all that he’s scowling bitterly at the ground.Then his expression flinches, as an icy drop of water lands on his cheek, heralding a freezing but light drizzle. “I have suffered nothing to what I’ve seen. Yet my sentiments fall on more deaf ears than yours.” Finally he turns his head up, and watches the sky after another drop hits his ear. Not even slavers, bandits nor beasts would be out in this weather, but here they are like two mad dogs. “But there is nothing to be done of Tevinter. When it surges anew, not like you intended, you’ll know you meant well.”

Anders chuckles; a wry, sad sound. “You have a strange degree of faith in my success.” He lifts his head, steps away, looking at Fenris with red-rimmed eyes. “There is nothing I can say that will move you, is there.” He bows his head, cold rain falling on his scalp, drop by drop. “Nothing I can show you of how many the Templars kill to maintain our fear of them, how many they abuse because that fear empowers them to do so. You asked me once if I had had no friends in the Circle. I didn’t. Most apprentices are dead or tranquil by age twenty-five. If they’re lucky they get to choose which. But there isn’t enough lyrium for all of us to be Harrowed. Only noble brats are guaranteed a chance to live, and they do so at the expense of the lives of commoners who live right beside them.”

Fenris drops his chin, turns it to watch Anders instead of the sky that threatens to lightly rain into his eyes, but shakes his head once, slowly. “Do not think that I haven’t understood. But realize Leandra is only a reminder of what I often saw, in Tevinter. I stood beside it long enough that it doesn’t sway me anymore.”

“I believe you,” Anders says. His shoulders slump as he exhales, and his gaze is downcast. “I still choose to act against an injustice that I know exists in the present, over one that might exist in the future. And if what you say does come to pass and somehow I’m still alive to see it… you can say ‘I told you so’ all you please, and I’ll throw whatever’s left of me against -that- injustice as well. But this is all becoming a tremendous mountain of might-be’s.” The rain is coming harder now, and the mage’s hair is wetted down and darkened. The tattered feathers on his coat regain their sheen, though they too lay slick against his shoulders.

Maybe if Anders keeps talking Fenris will eventually get it. A tiny part of him wants to, that they’d stop their bickering, but every time these issues come up Fenris rails against it even before words escape his lips, seemingly obvious points so ignored or overlooked he must voice them. “Your so called might-be’s are a luxury, when you might have everything to gain and slaves everything to lose. Realize that, at least.” The rain has begun to plaster down Fenris’ hair, the color no less white for it, tendriling and white down the back of his neck and forehead. But despite the weather the plant greens seem more vibrant, including his eyes. “Let’s go back.”

“I chose this and I will see it through.” Anders raises his head at last. His eyes are lead grey in the dim overcast light, all his colors leached out in the rain. “What would you think of me if I gave up? I may be mistaken, but I am not a coward or a fool. I must walk this path. I can’t do otherwise. I know - I’ve tried.” The mage falls into step beside Fenris even so. He looks at him with lips parted in a preamble to speech, but they close again, and his brows knit, a humbled and hopeless look etched in the shallow creases of his face. His arm makes an abortive movement in Fenris’s direction, just a small stuttered lift, and then drops back to his side, cold pale fingers closing in a loose, empty fist.

Fenris just continues back, oblivious to Anders’ attempts, voice as solemn as the rain but with the faintest smile. It doesn’t carve his lips, nothing so obvious, but it hints at the edges of his voice. “And I must accept it. Expecting otherwise would be an insult to you, regardless of me.” It’s always regardless of slaves, but he drops it with his silence, for now, and only then does he notice Anders’ expression. “What?”

“Thank you for staying,” Anders says. There’s such a plea in his eyes as he looks back at Fenris, but he can’t find anything more to say.

But the elf doesn’t immediately have any response to that, his steps simply slowing until they stop, feet numbed by the all too cold layer of mud slicking over the packed down path. “You’ve said that before. It doesn’t merit more gratitude than you’ve given.” 

A warm weight settles on Fenris’s shoulders from behind. Anders swallows a lump in his throat and leans against Fenris’s back for just a moment. “I’m sorry. What I meant was, 'I need you more than you know.’ That, and 'please never leave me.’ He straightens and steps back, leaving his coat on Fenris’s shoulders. Cold water runs down his cheeks as he looks up into the raining sky. His tunic is soaked through, translucent and sticking to his skin.

Fenris didn’t intend to stay still as long as he does, but the coat over his shoulders brings such an odd, if tattered reminder of Tevinter, and more importantly something that would never happen there. Even if he isn’t entirely sure of the original purpose, and he half turns. Then stops, unexpectedly again, having never seen the mage this way. "Let us move on. Before your gesture catches your death.”

Anders follows closely, with a quick nod and an uncertain smile. “It’s alright. I know a good healer,” he quips.


	39. Chapter 39

The rain only hits the mud heavier as they head back, small splots of brown splashing up over Fenris’ heels, the air sinking colder with a sharp ocean breeze. By the time his feet touch stone again not a word utters between them, both too miserable and picking up their pace to get back to dry warm crackling fireplaces. Something that seems so far from where they are.  
The door seems heavier and more sluggish, the hinges aching and groaning in place as Fenris finally pulls it open to escape inside. At least by now, the rain and puddles collecting in the town washed away any dirt that had caked to his ankles and between his toes. But that’s not what’s on his mind, with the coat clamped to his shoulders, all but soaked through and now more black than green. “Are you all right?”

Anders slouches in close behind Fenris, shutting and barring the door. He crouches in front of the hearth, water dripping from sodden hair and clothing, and he stirs the embers with the iron poker until they rise and catch at the wood he adds to the fire. It takes him a long time to answer, and when he does it’s with a tense, mute shake of his head.

Fenris stops near the arch of the main lobby, lets Anders on ahead to watch the mage as he pulls the coat from his shoulders, then the weightier sword that sinks to the floor with a sound that sharply cuts through the silence in the mansion. A small shiver runs over his skin, the brisk air of the mansion giving his bare arms goosebumps, and the coat is thrown back around him as he follows Anders, a bit faster after that silent reply, to stop a couple steps behind his crouched figure. “What is it?”

Anders stays crouched, hands held out to the fire. “I’m scared.” He whispers his reply and swallows hard, something in his throat that feels like a knot of dry hemp rope. “…Scared of so many things that I’ve lost count and I can’t run away from any of them.”

The mansion falls silent save the welcoming crackle of the fire, bringing life and light back the the carved stone, in Fenris’ habitual and sudden silence when a solemn topic comes up. He sighs, softly, just to break his own pause, kneels and then sits behind Anders, reaches forward with both hands to lightly clasp his shoulders and pull back, to topple him over. But still he manages the smallest smirk, at the very edge of one corner of his lips. “I’d say it’s about time you stopped running. But from what?”

Anders topples awkwardly when Fenris pulls on him, but he stays toppled, his dap cheek against Fenris’s chest. He can hear Fenris’s heartbeat like this and he welcomes it as much as he welcomes the contact, curling into him. “I’m afraid of the future. I’m afraid of hurting you, or losing you, or losing my life. I’m afraid this is all too good for me and I’m going to ruin it, and I’m afraid I can’t keep it anyway because everything is pressing forward. Everything is pressing on and I haven’t even wrapped my head around the moment I’m living in.”

Once Anders settles in place Fenris closes his arms around the mage, the wet coat covering them both. As tempting as it is to drop his chin into that water-darkened blond hair Fenris stays level, watching the fire and their empty surroundings protectively, and his voice comes low and soft from deep in his chest, barely disturbing the peace of the building now that they’re done clamoring in. “Of things you could worry about, I shouldn’t be one of them.”

“I know…” Anders voice never rises much above a sorrow-rough whisper. He bows his head against Fenris’s collarbone and shuts his eyes tight. “But still I’m afraid. You’ve done nothing to warrant it, but I still feel so afraid. That you would care for me is like this… this impossible thing. Like divine providence, like … something too good to be mine. Something too good to ever expect to keep. You changed my life into a life worth living.”

Fenris finally drops his head, at that, gaze still lifted as he kisses the top of Anders’ messy hair. When it parts he only pulls away enough to clear those strands, his breath still rustling through them, and his hug tightens, for such a short moment too tight and suffocating to be comfortable but genuine, before he controls his emotions and loosens. “I’m not leaving, as long as there is breath in me.”

Anders sobs. That hug might almost crack his ribs but he needs it, he wants it, and his arms warp around Fenris under the coat that blankets them both. He squeezes nearly as tight. “I love you. I love you and I will always want you near.” Tears flood his eyes and his breathing catches against that knot in his throat, no longer dry but as wet as the rest of them. “Please don’t leave me! Please never leave me alone…” The words flood into his mouth and rush out of him and tear loose something inside. His shoulders heave and shake and he weeps outright, arms tight around Fenris as he looses a flood of sorrow so deep he must have been drowning in it.

Fenris kisses Ander’s hair again, yet this time lets his lips linger there, the only remaining part of him that isn’t somehow touching or clamped to Anders for stability. “..te numquam deseram. You know this.” His words come just as softly spoken as the last, less accusatory and more comforting, an effort to stir the mage’s memory of all the times he’s said as much.

“I know… I know…” That torrent of sobs wracks Anders, but it starts to stutter and ebb. Warmth and firelight overtake the room, holding back the cold, and Anders grows still and peaceful in Fenris’s tight embrace, shuddering with a few last cries that seize him suddenly and involuntarily. He doesn’t move at all. His tight grip relaxes but his arms stay in place, while his breathing grows slow and even as if he’s close to sleep. 

Eventually Fenris moves, one of them had to at some point, an arm raising to hook a thumb under the top hem of the coat and slipping it off them, the soaked-heavy garment dropping to the floor in a loose circle around them. With the fire blazing warmer the air is fine enough. Then, just as carefully, Fenris folds and sinks the arm between their chests, and hooks a finger under Anders’ chin to lift it and raise him just enough to find his lips, press theirs close together and even if they don’t part it’s sure, and earnest, and the elf pulls away too quickly but some things need to be voiced before they consume you whole. “If there is a future to be had, I will face it gladly by your side.”

The tracks of hardship are still visible on Anders’s face, in his red-rimmed eyes and the deepening furrows between his brows. He looks into Fenris’s eyes when Fenris lifts his chin, wondering and defenseless, hazel eyes turned to warm amber in the firelight. His skin is dry now, but the colors of warmth still haven’t returned, and his pallor is like bone china, like porcelain, fragile. Yet at what Fenris says to him, rose blooms in his cheeks, on his parted, astonished lips, and he answers with a kiss of his own.  
“I belong to you and no one else.”

Fenris plants his lips to Anders’ forehead, because he has to and because he takes a deep breath, finding comfort in the mage’s smell, even when hidden and masked under water and lingering remnants from earlier that day. “I once wondered, if you’d come to your senses, see me for the rejected thing I am… I realized you to be far more stubborn than that.”

“If that’s sense to you then yes, I shall stubbornly remain mad and delusional, and treasure you more than life itself.” Anders’s hoarse, muted voice sounds confident in that. The levity in it doesn’t last, as Anders bows his head again and presses his damp hair up under Fenris’s chin. "I would drown us both in blood to keep you safe. If you came to harm because of me, it would be too much to bear.“

At first the only answer from Fenris comes as a small puff of air through his nose. “Is that not what we do already?” But the elf’s chin picks up from it’s damp perch, soon followed by the rest of him detaching from Anders a limb at a time, hovering as if the mage would collapse under the smallest strain, then gets up. To a crouch, anyway, and his arms curl around different places of Anders’ body before he hoists the man up in his arms, grip steady but not tight, and straightens.

Anders is reluctant to move, hunkering into Fenris as he starts to pull away. When the elf lifts him he makes a startled sound, his body tense and awkward. Then, he melts. His limbs relax and slacken, his body becomes supple in Fenris’s arms, and his cheek rests on the front of Fenris’s shoulder. His eyes watch Fenris’s face, still with their characteristic softness even widened as they are. He says nothing. Words wouldn’t suffice, anyway.

Fenris stands with Anders in his arms like that, motionless, expecting the mage to struggle in his surprise but nothing happens, so he turns and barely feels hindered by the fact that he’s carrying a man actually bigger than he is, supportive touch still steady and unwavering. As they move away from the fire to head upstairs, Fenris hugs Anders closer to his chest, tight but not uncomfortably so. “You’re cold.” Somehow he hadn’t noticed with the waves of heat from the fire. And he can’t imagine he’s any different, but holding Anders gives his arms a small shiver.

Anders shuts his eyes. He breathes slow and even, and he answers Fenris’s statement with a small nod that rubs his cheek against his shoulder. “I barely feel it now,” he says. He had shivered on the long walk home, but numbness had set in over time, or else his body had decided it wasn’t worth fighting a losing battle against the cold. His voice is drowsily quiet. “You shouldn’t fret over me. You’re too kind to me as it is. It wouldn’t do for me to get used to it.”

“If it comforts you, I’ll be sure to warm the fire with your books.” Fenris moves quickly, and faster as Anders goes quieter, but his movements are still smooth as he pads along the polished stone. But when he reaches the bedroom he comes to a halt by the fireplace, with lively, recent coals glowing there and the smallest fire, and he awkwardly manages to lean, reaching with the arm under the mage’s knees, to throw fresh wood on. His grip on the small logs is weak but it doesn’t matter and they still move with little effort, and soon after he finally plants Anders on the bed, and stands to work off his clothes. “Strip.” It’s not sexy, just a simple command that he obeys too. At least the clasps are easier to undo when they’re wet, and it’s not long before he’s peeling out of his top and starts on his pants.

Is it even possible for Fenris to command someone to strip and have it not be sexy? Anders obeys as quickly as he can. He groans as he pulls his wet tunic off over his head, arms stretching reluctantly and at restrained angles. The same again as he pushes off his trousers and his smalls and his body reacts with a dozen small aches and pangs of pain. He scoots the covers down with his feet in a series of small kicks, and then he sits up, watching Fenris. The light of the fire behind him traces the elf’s sleek outline in reddish gold. That same light catches the planes and angles of Anders’s face and smooths them somehow. “If it pleases you to see them burn I’d put them on the fire myself.”

Fenris pauses in place to look up at that, bent over and balancing on one foot, the other bent and tucked upward as he pulls it from his remaining clothes. “And your manifesto, crumpled in the center?” It’s worth a shot, and he remains in the pose that would be so awkward if it weren’t so unexpectedly lovely, at least until he finally looks down to drop his bare foot and pick up the other.

“No one will listen.” Anders looks back at him with a wan smile and winces as fresh tears rise. “I would have liked those words to matter, but they’d be doing more for the world as kindling.”

Fenris straightens again, clothing haphazardly tossed to the floor in wet slumps, closer to the fire where they can dry and be stiff and crumply in the morning. He regards the man not for the fact that they’re both naked, a small part of him content that they’re this comfortable, but from his tone, and it flinches the middle of his eyebrows lower. “Did you lose your demon in the rain?”

“No.” Anders has only that short, simple answer to give. He wraps his arms around himself but he doesn’t draw the covers up.

Fenris doesn’t immediately have an answer to that. Nothing quite seems sufficient to say, that wouldn’t be obvious or equally unhelpful, like saying ‘you look terrible’ when someone is ill. So he says nothing, doesn’t try to rationalize to the man that he’s tired, though it’s true so much farther than that word can even reach with it’s meaning, and settles onto the bed, the mattress sinking from his settling weight pointed to one knee, one arm to Anders’ shoulders for support and his lips pressed to the mage’s forehead. “Come here. I’m not going to let you ruin so easily.”

Anders leans into that embrace. He puts his arms around Fenris’s waist as he scoots closer and invests what energy he still has in snuggling up against his lover. His eyes narrow with tenderness when Fenris’s lips touch his forehead, and he gives an answering kiss against the crest of Fenris’s shoulder. “I know,” he murmurs. “Maker,” he swears as he rests his cheek on Fenris’s chest, listening for a reprise of the steady heartbeat that had lulled him while Fenris had carried him to bed. “You make my whole world warmer and brighter.”

The arm around Anders’ shoulders moves, palm flat and spread across the gentle sweeps of muscles and dip of spine, then curves closer towards the front, curls into a loose grip to press the mage back to the bed. And Fenris follows, unwinds and stretches out, catlike along the body under him, then reaches back to pull the thick cover over them both. “Warmer, anyway. I wasn’t aware the arguments were ‘bright’.” 

“The kisses are dazzling, however.” Anders groans as he stretches out on his back, finally giving some slack to every stiff ligament and sore joint. His body tenses and eases in waves while warmth seeps into his skin. It’s a pleasure so intense that it makes him ache, as his body awakens to how cold it really was. “And I would rather be bickering with you than having a civilized teatime conversation with nearly anybody else in Thedas.”

Fenris props his elbows just above Anders’ shoulders, his forearms muffed over Anders’ ears and the tips of his fingers idly toying with what blond, water slick hair. “I was rather under the impression that you only tolerated it.”

"It drives me mad,” Anders says. He gives Fenris’s lean waist a squeeze with his arms, a gesture that always brings his thoughts to how slim the elf is about the waist and hips – slim and solid simultaneously. coupled with the way Fenris’s graceful fingers toy with his hair, some color returns to his cheeks. “But somehow I can’t stop once we start.”

“Mm.” Fenris seems satisfied enough but not particularly content with that answer.His head sinks, shoulders taking the weight and arching upwards as he drops his forehead to the center of Anders’ cold collarbone. “I apologize.” Sorry for the annoyance he’s caused, sorry for knowing he won’t stop, sorry that it’s one of the only ways he seems capable to try to express himself, and damn him that anything he could come up with feels cheap.

“There’s no need.” Anders’s voice thrums softly near Fenris’s ear. “I love your intensity. And even when you’re glaring at me it means I’m the center of your attention. After a while it began to feel…” Anders pauses to chuckle awkwardly under his breath. “…Flattering? That you’d corner me and confront me rather than just turning your back and dismissing me.” Anders rolls onto his side to intertwine himself more thoroughly with Fenris, reaching down to guide one of Fenris’s thighs over his hip. “Maybe you haven’t noticed…” his voice is even quieter now. “…but… when you grab hold of me… whether you want to push me, pull me, or pin me… I love it. The second you touch me I know that you still want me… and it is so hard to fight, after that.”

Fenris does manage a small smirk at that, that telltale crease at the corner of his lips, out of view until he manages to raise his head. “Nobody else matters to me. I know that-…” He lets his head fall again, this time tipped to one side, and forces himself to continue.. “I just want you to understand.”


	40. Chapter 40

Anders leans back in the bath, hands poised on the surface of the water to heat it with magic while Fenris is out of the room. He keeps his power flowing until vapor rises in small whiffs from the tub and the chipped mirror in the room is fogged completely. With the weather turning cold, Anders savors any chance to be warm and secure. While it seems decadent to him to be back in the bath not long after taking one, he supposed he should have expected the mess the two of them made. And he would rather be with Fenris than be practical, any day of the week, which when he gave it a moment’s thought summed up their entire relationship rather well.

Fenris had left at least with the decency to throw a towel over his waist, some small paranoia creeping in. Orana wasn’t slavers no more than seeing his dick wouldn’t kill him, but the tiny instincts were there even if she wasn’t.   
There’s no sound to his padding feet, especially when not loaded down with the sword that remains propped in the bedroom, and the silence becomes comfortable enough that he winces when the door to the washroom squeaks on its hinges and he’s quick to sidestep through the frame, a dark bottle of wine in each hand, and shoves it closed with a foot behind him, but not all the way to. Light might escape but it’s easier to hear an approach when footfalls don’t have to travel through a heavy wood door, and he knows it just as well as he knows there’s a sharp enough blade in the mage’s shaving kit on the counter nearby.  
Habits die hard, and it’s why he curses softly under his breath, less a word than a tsk of annoyance before he lets the towel fall and steps into the bath, offering out one of the bottles as he settles his back to the opposite of the tub. 

Anders feasts his eyes when Fenris lets his towel drop away. Leaning back against the edge of the tub with his arms resting on the tub’s rim, he looks horribly insolent, in a satisfied and feline way. It doesn’t take long for that smug smirk to give way to a wide and dopey grin, however. "I’ve been realizing something,“ Anders states.

The elf sinks into the water, notes the extra warmth to it but too hypocritically content on the idea to complain about it, and props his crossed ankles on a far rim while he sinks back with a bottle to his lips. He sighs through his nose and is momentarily too busy to care about anything, save maybe the expression on the mage’s face. He raises an eyebrow, somewhat wary. “What?”

Anders takes his own bottle and drinks, a sip at first and then a long, indulgent quaff. "That I’m happier with you than I’ve ever been in my life.” He casually loops one arm around Fenris’s calves, caressing him.

Fenris’ leg pulls, just narrowly avoids picking away from Anders’ touch entirely before coming to a forced stop still within reach. “Really. You’ve been quite trying, I assumed the same of me.” And as well aware he is of his issues, Fenris hides any additional emotion to his comment behind his bottle.

Anders looks sheepish at that, and he lowers his bottle from his lips as he dips his chin. "You’ve been worth it,“ is his meek reply. He lets his touch drop away from Fenris’s legs. "Can you forgive me for … I suppose there’s a lot I could repent.”

And this time Fenris does pick up his feet, both of them, lets them sink into the water as he sits up to regard Anders more seriously. Or try to, as he takes a sip off the rim of his bottle. “I can’t forgive you if you don’t tell me, Anders.”

“For …” Anders looks down at the water and shakes his head. "For belonging to a cause you hate. For being born a mage. For… not being enough.“

There’s a silence that falls between them as Fenris regards him, not an awkward one, simply there as the elf thinks about it, eyes drifting downward to nothing in particular, the rippling water distorting the stone flooring. When he looks back up his features are cast harder, eyes stern but not cold. "No. If you don’t intend to put an end to it, then don’t ask for forgiveness.”

“Very well.” Anders speaks with quiet resignation. He considers for a moment before he lifts the bottle to his mouth again, drinking too deep to savor the wine. "Then forgive me, that I’m a burden you scarcely need.“

Fenris sighs, his voice carrying with it and irritated and he follows suit with his wine to clear his mind, gather some modicum of patience to keep him from getting up and leaving. ”/Mage/…the only time you’re a burden is when you don’t accept what you are.“

"And just what am I?” Anders’s words have an edge to them, but his tone is mild. He lifts his face again, trying to read Fenris’s expression.

Why is this so bloody obvious to only him. It has to be some sort of joke, a trick question. Or so they can all have a laugh at how wrong the slave is. But Fenris’ll play, the wine will ensure he’s not soft about it. “You look like someone who isn’t sure enough of their cause to deserve it yet. Or like a mage that isn’t even sure if he wants to be one.”

Anders barks a laugh at that. "No mage I’ve met wants to be one. And I’m sure enough of my cause. I haven’t given it up for you, and that should tell you something.“ Anders takes another drink and sinks himself a bit deeper in the bathwater. The caps of knees peek out from the surface like islands. "I’m sure enough of my cause,” he repeats, “and what it will cost me. You just had to come along and make me want to live.”

“You certainly don’t act it. If it doesn’t matter how I feel about it, don’t apologize for something you don’t think you should spare apologies for. And don’t fight unless you can accept what it is you’re fighting for.”

“I love you, damn it! That’s all I’m trying to say! I love you and you aren’t arguing me out of it!”

Fenris belts out a harsh chuckle, turns his chin and pries his eyes away from Anders’ outburst, and only quiets when he swallows more wine. “I wasn’t trying to.”

The water in the tub sloshes loudly as Anders moves. He awkwardly gets to his knees and brings himself and his wine bottle over to Fenris’s end of the tub, where he attempts to take up residence in the elf’s lap. "I love you and you do make me happy. /Furiously/ happy. And I will keep trying to do the same for you, Maker help me or not.“ Anders quaffs another mouthful of wine while staring defiantly at Fenris from point blank range.

Fenris’ eyes flick to meet Anders’ gaze even as his head retreats back an inch, always feeling a bit startled by the how forward the man is. And he finds his mind coming with a blank for words, the silence between them starting to linger, which makes him more embarrassed than Anders’ actions. In the end he fumbles for something, anything, to take up the space. “I know.”

Anders presses his lips up against Fenris’s mouth then, firm puckered lips parting with a shameless smooching sound. He looks satisfied when he pulls back again, and settling against Fenris’s body he takes another sip of wine. "Good.”

Fenris barely has time to react to the kiss, too stunned, moreso each time. He was expecting his words would have hurt with their simplicity, imagined Anders would have made some dry remark as he got up to leave and the elf wouldn’t follow, just take another drink to drown the fact that he constantly ruins things, so he pauses when the opposite happens. And some part of him notices that he never felt this unsteady with Isabela, together or otherwise. It takes him a few moments, haltingly, to remember to speak, his brows furrowing. “We were… arguing, a moment ago. And then you kissed me.”

“Yes. Do you want to argue more, or kiss more?” The look of perplexity on Fenris’s face is something to treasure, so Anders, smiling, brushes the elf’s hair back with one gentle hand. "It’s warm here, I have a bottle of wine and a gorgeous naked lover. I’m determined to enjoy this. /Determined/.“ There’s an unvoiced laugh glimmering in Anders’s eyes.

Any and all confusion melts off at Anders’ words, like he’s been reminded that it’s quite possible the mage isn’t as seductive as he initially seems, simply mad. But there’s still the smallest quirk there on his lips, a fondness for it whether his behavior is madness or not. “I was more wondering how we got from one to the other. Or can you no longer hold an argument without kissing me?”

"I could, but I can’t imagine why I’d want to.” Anders combs his fingers through Fenris’s hair again. "As for how we got there… I realized we were having a pointless argument, and all I’d actually wanted to do was tell you I adore you. I thought kissing you might work out better than mincing words.“

Fenris flinches his brow rather suddenly at the touch, but doesn’t pull away so much as just turn his head to one side, and escapes thinking about it as he reaches up, hand brushing the blonde’s to steal a drink from the mage’s bottle. “You had no idea what I was trying to tell you anyway.”

"Probably not,” Anders agrees. "Are you angry with me?“ Anders lets Fenris’s touch brush his hand aside.

Fenris stops, considering the bottle before offering it back. “I was trying to insist you stand up for yourself. To me included.”

Anders blinks at that, his expression blank as he spends a moment in thought. "I’m afraid of doing something you’d hate me for,” he says earnestly, taking the bottle and drinking.

Finally the elf tips his head back out of Anders’ grasp, turns it so he can go back to drinking his own wine before leveling the mage with a critical look. “I’m here, aren’t I?”

“I know.” Anders answers, mitigating his sheepish look. "But the part of me that feels afraid isn’t all that rational. And then there’s this other part of me next door to that one that says you deserve better than what I’ve got to give. That part doesn’t listen, either.“

A small frown tugs at Fenris’ expression, finally looking more like.. well. How he always does around anyone else, sour and critical, when they’re out or with Hawke or the like, when everything is irritating in the world and smiles are rare unicorns. The reason why people would likely rarely believe Fenris ever has a truly ‘good mood’. And he raises his elbow to the back edge of the tub, knuckles coming to rest on one temple. “Here I was assuming you’d come to your senses. Eventually.”

"I didn’t know it was ‘eventually’ already.” Anders sighs when he sees Fenris’s mood deteriorate. However hard he tries to steer things in the opposite direction, they seem determined to trend this way instead. "It’s… a little like learning to let me touch you. Someday I won’t think I’m just one misstep away from rejection.“

The glare softens, a little, as the elf glances down. “There’s a difference between my skin, and you being stubborn. You’re an abomination and you listen to neither of us.” He doesn’t believe it though. Not really.

"I do listen. If I didn’t listen I’d never believe that you could love me.” Anders settles with his back against Fenris’s chest, his legs partly curled to one side. "But I do. And that brings me back to the part about how happy you make me.“

“Well before we talk in more circles,” Despite any mood swings Fenris seems content enough once they’ve settled together, breath and beat steady at Anders’ shoulderblades, and he only shifts enough to take another drink. “The most embarrassing thing you’ve been caught doing.”

"Hmmm.” Anders leans back and hunkers down into the bath until he can comfortably rest his head against Fenris’s shoulder. He begins to grin. “That would have to be the time I tried to surreptitiously pick my nose during sermon and wipe it on the knight captain’s pauldron. He just happened to turn his head and there I was, with an enormous slimy snot on my index finger, holding it up like I wanted to show it off to him. He offered to measure it like a fish and record my catch for posterity. Told me that having such a huge nose, he figured huge snots must come with the territory.”

The shoulder Anders is resting against nearly throws him from the elf’s sudden heave of a choke, barely and sharply stifling some horrible mix of a laugh and a gag. Even as he recovers he makes a scrunched look of true disgust you should only reserve for blood magic or fish. “I was expecting.. not that.”

Anders tilts his head to grin at Fenris. “If you wanted me to tell you a masturbation story you should’ve just asked. But honestly, those sermons were four hours long and that booger had to go.”

Fenris sets the bottle on the thick stone edge of the tub, his fingertips slipping from the thin glass neck to plaster across his face while his other meekly pushes at Anders’ shoulder in a momentary need to push him away. “/Please/ stop. Now I’m going to be reminded, every time I look at you.”

 

Anders pouts as Fenris nudges him away. “You /asked/. Alright, alright, ask me another one, I’ll try to be tasteful I promise.” Yet Anders has one hand behind his back with his fingers crossed, and the other poised with a finger up his nostril just for Fenris to behold when he takes his hand away from his eyes.

Fenris groans some small grumbling, pained sound of what answer Anders could come up next but he thinks, hand slipping to rub at one eyelid, opening the other  
and he freezes, then gives the mage’s shoulder a much harder and intentioned shove. “Pfaugh, don’t be repulsive!”

Anders cackles even as he’s effectively shoved backwards into the tub, flailing. He splutters water as he surfaces and shoves his soaked hair out of his eyes. “What a noise you just made! Now you, I’m sure you’ve never done anything less than gorgeously refined and heartbreakingly graceful in your life. I don’t think I’ve ever even heard a fart out of you. Do elves not fart, or just you?”

“Are you purposely trying to drive me away, or are you just that talented!?”

“I was hoping to make you, maybe, /laugh/.”

“Well you’re doing a wretched job of it!” Fenris snaps back, defensively, but clearly isn’t at all serious, though his face is too scrunched to even begin to smile. But at least he stays put, watching Anders warily.

“I thought you wanted me to be more persistent. Make up your mind.” Anders pulls his knees to his chest and props his chin on them, smiling puckishly. 

“How is that- ugh, /nevermind/. I tried to change the subject and you ruined it.”

“Then what’s the most embarrassing thing you’ve ever been caught doing? Aside from living with me, that is.”

“I don’t know…” Fenris knits his brow as he looks up towards the ceiling in thought, because nothing immediate comes to mind save the horror he was just subjected to. "…trying to surmise where the bathroom was when the Fog Warriors finally stopped chaining me down.“

Anders smirks at that. "I hope somebody pointed you in the right direction.”

“Eventually. There was rather horrible gesturing involved.”

Anders snickers at the image that brings to mind. “Let me ask you another one, then. If you could use magic, what’s the first thing you’d do with it?”

“I’d stop using it. When did you know?”

“I was eight years old. One of the farm cats was dying. I didn’t want her to go…” Anders hunkers down against his knees a little more, gazing at the rippling surface of the water. “And while I was petting her and telling her it would be alright… I could feel what was wrong. And I made it better.”

In turn Fenris sits up, just a hair more. But he narrows his eyes. “But you were eight. How do you know you weren’t simply” he waves his hand, "imagining it?“

"Because I knew. The same way you know you’re seeing me sitting here and not simply imagining it.” Anders’s voice takes a harder edge.

Fenris sighs dramatically, sinking back in place and finally picking up his wine again. “An animal had gas and you ‘cured’ it. Surely you have something more than you knew.”

Anders looks up with narrowed eyes. “I spent the next five years dreading what eventually happened to me because 'an animal had gas’. What is your bloody problem with me tonight?”

Fenris sighs again, but more in earnest. “Then tell me. I do want to know.”

“Magic is a force and a sense. It’s like having hands. You feel it, you use it. I felt it. And as time went on I tried to tell myself I’d imagined it, but I kept feeling it, and I kept being able to make things happen with that feeling.” 

“Sounds.. right, I suppose.” Fenris goes a bit quieter, glancing down to his glass before tipping it back, but only for an unusually small sip. “And the cat?”

“How kind of you to pretend to care for my sake. She was still alive when the Templars hauled me off.”

Fenris nearly shoots him with a glare, but it ends up landing on nothing in particular. The tiled wall. “I care because you do.”

“And yet a minute ago she was an animal with gas. I cared just as much then, but you sure as fuck didn’t. Why does it seem like you only care once you can tell you hurt me? That isn’t love, that’s -guilt-.”

Fenris glances up, not angry, or glaring, perhaps a vague sense of panic before his eyes fall back to the water between them. How does it suddenly feel like such a large expanse. “Then why did you say you knew? Tell a blind man that you simply know what the sun looks like, when he asks.”

“Because you asked me to tell you something important to me and then you doubted I even knew what I was talking about.” Anders is hunched in a tight ball. The water is still warm, and the air in the room still heavy with vapor. Anders lifts his head, craning his neck to look around anxiously.

“Because it didn’t make sense.” Fenris clenches his free hand into a tight fist, but forces it forward, palm up, and he flinches as he does. It was hard enough, convincing himself that magic wasn’t going to shoot needles of pain into him every time the mage touched him, and specifically inviting it now brings some of that instinct back. But he doesn’t mind suffering, for how Anders looks as he does now. “So come show me.”

Anders has his eyes locked on one of the room’s small, high windows. The deep, slow breath he draws is measured and deliberate, and it takes a moment of that before he’s able to turn his face towards the room again and look at Fenris’s outstretched hand. He lays his own hand on it, carefully. “I’ve been in this room too long,” he says quietly. “Can we move?”

Fenris closes his hand, tight before he can pull away instinctively. “Of course.” As he stands, no hesitation at the request, the water falls from him in a rush, sending a small chaos of ripples across the tub, and he lifts their hands a few inches in a silent offer to help Anders up with his grip. The wine is left and forgotten on the bath edge, and for all the elf cares the alcohol and the water can remain there until morning.

Anders grips Fenris’s hand as he gets to his feet, stepping out of the tub and shedding water on the stone floor. He steps carefully to keep from slipping, picking up his towel and once again slinging it over his shoulders rather than around his waist. When they return to the bedroom he stands by the window for a moment, gazing out. “I’m not quite sure how to do what you ask.”

Fenris stops by the door, reaching behind him to absently push it closed while he watches Anders, shrugs and feels altogether useless to that question even if the mage can’t see it. Only when he hears that click of the door as a latch falls in place does he move, and takes a few steps closer. But he stops, hesitant and unsure if Anders even wants to be near him right now. “I have no idea. Though I might know the answer already.”

The look in Fenris’s eyes when Anders turns away from the window makes him feel as if his heart has been pierced. He closes the distance between them to take Fenris’s hands in his, not pulling him close but inviting with a gentle tug and soft, beseeching eyes.

This time the grip isn’t fast enough, and when Fenris pulls his hands away with a small jerk he pauses, leans his forehead closer until their hair is barely brushing the other’s skin. But he turns his head towards the fireplace, still lit though not blazing. “Here. Unless you intend to drench the bed.” He leads, tentatively, to sit them down on the rug in front of the fire.

Anders keeps still, even holding his breath for the moment that Fenris leans close. Then he follows his lover to the hearthside rug. He drops his towel there and steps over it to the pile of firewood they keep handy. Couching down, he adds two thick wedges of timber to the low fire in the hearth, then takes his place at Fenris’s side, sitting on his heels. “This should do. I’ll give the fire a little help.” He hesitates, turning to look at Fenris and watch his expression. “Are you alright?”

Fenris draws a leg up as he settles on the floor, dropping his arm over it elbow to knee. His gaze remains steady on the fire, eyes and pupils glinting the light, expression somber, dimmer than usual and quiet. It’s not until Anders asks that he glances up, as if he’d forgotten the mage was there for a split second. “I’m fine. Why?”

Anders shrugs, but he keeps his gaze on Fenris, steady and thoughtful, taking a moment to choose his words. “You flinched. Your feelings are important to me and I don’t want to make you afraid… ” Anders’s slender hands rest in his lap. His hair has started to dry and red-gold wisps catch the dim firelight like a shattered halo.

“I’m not /afraid/.” Fenris is quick to scoff back at it, the deeper emotions crossing his face vanishing for some small aggression, more instinctive than directed, and the moment he realizes it he looks down, chin dipping as it follows his eyes. When he finally overcomes himself to speak again, it’s softer, and more purposeful. “It was nothing. Just unexpected.”

That answer doesn’t satisfy Anders, but it does tell him how Fenris is likely to feel if he goes on pressing. “Then I’ll get started.” He turns his body towards the fireplace and he draws a deep breath. Usually this is second nature to him, so simple that slowing down and explaining is a surprising challenge. “It’s not easy to convey this. I’ve lived with it my whole life and it’s hard to conceive what it would be like to be normal. Anything I can tell you will be just… strained metaphors… but I’ll do my best. Magic is something we usually talk about like a force, or an action, but it’s also a medium, all around us like air and water. I can feel it within me like the pressure of air in my lungs or blood in my veins… always there to the point that I’m not always especially aware of it. And I can feel it in the world around me, almost like… like you would feel the temperature of the air in a room. Again, if it’s mild, you might not have any real awareness of it, but it’s still there.” Anders turns to Fenris then and smiles a bit bashfully. “Sometimes I can feel you at my back. Your lyrium… I guess I’d call it ‘warm’, and you radiate it a bit even when you aren’t using it.”

Fenris bends the arm resting against his leg, turns it so his hand can cup under his chin, fingers lazily spreading across his lips and pointer trailing alongside his nose to rest at the inner corner of one eye, as he regards Anders neutrally. He’d thought he had some idea, but this is different than he envisioned or knows. Not that it really matters, details like this don’t change anything, yet something still nags at him like he’s betraying himself by asking. But he continues anyway. “Good I don’t make a habit of hiding. I’m not surprised, nobody stops using muscles until they die.”

“When I cast a spell, I’m just working on that 'medium’, trying to effect it in some specific way. It feels like stretching out some part of my mind, my will, and agitating the world around me with it. Pushing, pulling, stirring, splashing… there’s no end to the way your will can move through this medium, but you have to be wary because there are always results. You have to focus your intentions and be deliberate about it, a bit like writing words on a page takes thought and finesse.” Anders smirks self-deprecatingly at that. “Thought and finesse… I’m not sure magic could have been given to a worse suited person than me. But this is why mages have to learn control. The same way a struggling person lashes out in distress with their limbs and their screams, a mage lashes out with their will. We can learn to discipline that impulse and be very aware of it… but it never comes naturally, any more than it would come naturally to you never to use your left hand.”

Fenris cracks a small, humorless smirk at that. “Either hand.” A soft sigh punctuates it, and his hand pulls away from his chin so he can regard the scars running down in perfectly carved paths to his fingertips, though he’s obviously known them as long as he can remember, and closes it into a loose fist of curving pale lines. “But I only have as far as my reach, and nothing I feel is as you describe.” What it does describe, what Fenris won’t mention because they’ve been down this road before, is something that still bothers him deeply, in the end.

Anders nods slowly, eyes on Fenris’s face, the twist at the corners of his mouth. “Still… if you imagine that every mage you’ve met in the free marches, when they aren’t using magic, has their hands clasped behind their back as if bound there… it wouldn’t be a bad metaphor. In the Circles, we’re trained that way until it’s second nature to hesitate before we cast. New apprentices are given a shock or a slap if they reach out with magic without being explicitly told.” Anders shrugs again, both in his shoulders and in his expression, looking away. “But I suppose I should get on with this. It’s a bad habit I’ve picked up. We’re not supposed to use magic for what we can do by mundane means. But I like to keep it warm in here.”

Some small consolation, at least. But Fenris still narrows his eyes somewhat. “A shortcut is a shortcut.” His hand drops outward and palm up, though he suspects any outburst, even simple debating, will be ignored he can’t leave it unsaid and boiling at the back of his throat. “Make shortcuts of what’s 'worthy of magic’s time’ and you only grow used to doing great and terrible things.” But without even looking up to the mage his shoulders slump, and adds with a grumble, “I’d much rather you all become lazy with simpler tasks, and with any luck become unable to use your arms.”

Anders sighs heavily, a self-deprecating smile reappearing on his lips. It’s one thing to argue with Fenris, but another thing entirely to try and defend himself when he knows he’s in the wrong. He shifts onto his knees and crawls over to the hearth, crouches there and begins stirring the embers with the old iron poker, feeding them with kindling. “Then I guess this can wait until I have something impossible to do.”

Fenris draws up his other knee, crosses his arms along the top. “Only feeling responsibility the one time I ask you to do otherwise?” A long hissed sigh, and the elf settles his chin low against the closely drawn crook of one arm. “Even I have a cheap trick for building up a fire, don’t act that guilty.”

“Do you want me to be good or do you want me to be yours?” Anders looks over his shoulder, his gaze turning imploring when he sees the way Fenris curls in on himself. The way that even if he obeyed the impulse to lunge in for a kiss, he has his arm across his mouth, his posture solitary and defensive. “I’d rather be yours,” he says, answering his own question. He sits down, stretching his hands out to the small licks of flame he’s stoked up. “I can feel the fire and see the fire and hear the fire the same way you do… er, well, not as well as you do, given you’re an elf, but you understand. But if I reach out with my mind I can also feel it flickering in that other medium, with that other sense I told you about. Fire is always moving, rising and falling like a tide. If I want to make the flames rise, I lean into that rising motion. I try to do it carefully, keeping time with the rhythm the flames have naturally, because I don’t want an especially voracious fire… I just want to coax it to grow.” As Anders speaks, the flames lick at the timbers and the fresh wood begins to kindle. The fire grows bit by bit to a cheery, warm blaze.

Fenris can’t help but chuckle at that small stumble of words, the sound unexpected and dying back to silence and a short hum under his breath, all haphazard stumbling of his own. “It sounds more complicated. Why worry about control when you can just poke at it.” He reaches an arm out towards the wood, the pile far closer to Anders, the knee it had rested on beginning to sink. “Hand me a smaller one.”

Anders pulls a thinner piece of firewood from the pile, handing it to Fenris and reorienting himself to face him. That chuckle hangs in the air like a falling leaf, and Anders smiles again, soft and wondering. “It is, I’m just… at a loss to explain it.”

Fenris completely shifts on the floor, takes the wood by on end, picks his other arm up as he crosses his legs. His free hand opens, flexes and digs forward, sparks of blue tears in the air that start at his fingertips as his hand forces through the thick fabric of the air into the fade. The glow shreds down past his wrist, far brighter without the armor on, when his hand touches and passes into the free end of the smaller log. The wood immediately hisses, squeaks of air and sap escaping before it dries, popping loudly as it cracks then catches fire. He lightly tosses it in with the rest, hand backing down and taking far less effort to return to normal, and the fireplace looses a small puff of sparks. “Simple.”

Anders chews his lower lip, raising one hand to the back of his neck to rub the fuzz under his damp hair. “Is it wrong for me to think that’s extremely… well… /cool/?”

“Killing mages is cool, now? Nobody else has said as much.” Fenris shrugs, oblivious to how much of a spectacle it might be. Especially not to a mage, they tend to make things happen and glow rather often. He looks down at his palm, like it would give him some answer. “It’s the same as before. Only with wood, instead.”

“Then I guess it is.” Anders shrugs, looking away, his posture somewhere between awkward and bashful.

Fenris looks up, attention turning from the fire to Anders completely, his palm closing then both hands slowly dropping to his sides and planting behind him. “What’s wrong?” Though perhaps he should say what has he done wrong, because for all their time together the elf never remembers seeing Anders look like this while they’re with Hawke.

Anders lifts his head again. “I keep getting on your bad side tonight. That, and you are all the way over there, not touching me in any way…” His smile is small and sheepish, fading quickly.

Fenris’ brow topples forward, scrunching the top edge of his defined nose without snarling in a way only elves really can, his eyes training towards the fire in thought. “Perhaps I haven’t been clear on what my bad side is, but I don’t recall trying to kill you.”

“In that case, it’s a little disappointing, how bad at this I still am. But maybe it stands to reason. I wasn’t even with Karl as long as I’ve been with you, now.” Anders leans back, arms braced and weight propped up on the heels of his hands.

 

“I’m sorry. It’s not you, I’m just…” Fenris raises a hand, trying to conjure some explanation but nothing comes to mind and he just ends up looking all the more frustrated for it. “..me.” The motion in his hand weakens and falls, fingertips resting along his forehead in defeat, and he leans into it, silent a moment, before quietly adding, “But you can’t blame me if you’re not touching me and want to.”

“Ah,” Anders says. His smile is modest but the warmth in his eyes is back in force. He crawls across the small space between them and does his best to curl up in Fenris’s lap like an oversize cat. “I can accept that,” he says softly.

Fenris raises his hands, in surprise and to keep them out of the way as Anders settles against him, and only when the mage has completely stopped moving he carefully props an elbow to the man’s hip, propping up his chin while the other hand absently draws into blonde hair. And he sighs, a slow deep breath that releases his tension. “I thought you’d been with Karl longer.”

“He… we knew eachother a while before we started having trysts. He mentored me, in the months leading up to my harrowing. I thought that after I was harrowed he might want to… that it might be safer to care about me. But nothing changed. We stopped seeing eachother.”

Fenris shifts his chin in the cup of his palm, knuckles rolling against his cheek as he turns his head to look down. “Safer to care about you?”

“Yes. I was set to be harrowed young. For most that’s a death sentence. Between that and me being his student, he had plenty of reasons not to let things get too involved between us.” Anders gazes up at Fenris from where his head rests on the elf’s thigh. “He dumped me three days after I was harrowed. I showed up at his quarters with my pillow and a stolen bottle of wine to chide him about not coming to see me since. And he told me he’d been meaning to end things for a while, but he hadn’t wanted me to have that rejection on my mind during the rite. Wanted the opportunity to let me down ‘easy,’ if there is such a thing.”

Fenris leaves the prop of his hand, curls as he leans in to place a small kiss on Anders’ lips, his top and bottom edges to the mage’s corners, no passion and all sympathetically delicate before he straightens again. “Would it have changed anything, if you’d known?”

Anders smiles a bit at that kiss. Fenris’s tenderness is a refuge from what he recollects. “In practical terms, no. I would have thought of running again, if I hadn’t thought I might have had a future with Karl. But I don’t think I would have. I think I would’ve been too damned angry, I would’ve realized I had too much to prove. After I got over the hurt I was angry at him anyhow… that he thought I couldn’t make it without a pleasant lie to hold onto, or that he’d led me on to keep me compliant to the Circle, when whatever went on between him and me was nobody’s business.”

Fenris returns his chin to his hand, watching Anders’ words pass the mage’s lips from the corner of his eyes. “If he hurt you and made you so angry… I don’t understand. Why did you contact him again, here?” But really, he doesn’t just mean Karl. The elf imagines he feels the same breed of betrayal from his sister, and he can’t imagine replying to a correspondence of hers, much less following through with something for so far.

“He was a good man, a good mage. I’ve been hurt by plenty of people, it doesn’t mean they aren’t good people. Also, Karl contacted me… or I should say, he contacted the mage underground and when I saw his name attached to the missive it sort of became my business.” Anders pauses, watching Fenris’s face with quiet calm. “I couldn’t just let him be in danger when all he’d done against me was reject me as a lover. It wasn’t what he wanted and that’s his choice. I…” Anders swallows. “I cared for him anyway.”

Fenris turns his eyes down with a small tip of his chin, eyelids chasing after to close and hide a small flash of disappointment. It makes sense, but he can’t imagine himself applying it to his own situations, and despite his closed eyes his brows gently knit. Troubled by the fact that he wouldn’t pass the same kindness to Varania if given the choice. “You’re stronger than I would be.”

Anders watches Fenris’s expression close to shutter away some unwelcome feeling. He brushes the knuckles of a half-closed hand against Fenris’s cheek. "What’s on your mind?“

 

The elf’s skin doesn’t move, or twitch, or flinch, just breathes a slow sigh to steady his mind, and when Fenris warily cracks open his eyes he’s looking away, keeping focus as he answers because there’s no other way they’ll escape. “Varania, I… I did intend to kill her. I don’t know what I would do if I saw her, in person and not some letter to be ignored.”

Anders begins to uncurl from Fenris’s lap, enough to sneak an arm around his waist and hug him. "You want to forgive her?” He looks up to see Fenris’s eyes turned away, as if he doesn’t want to look at his own bitterness point blank, or doesn’t want Anders to see it there in his eyes. He shifts a bit more, not to force his way into Fenris’s view, but to pull him into an embrace if he’ll allow it. "I can’t vouch for how much my advice is worth… but if you ever see her again, I think you would get more from hearing her out, than from taking revenge.“

There’s no resistance against Anders, whether shifting his weight or hugging the elf’s waist, Fenris completely limp to any movements that technically aren’t his own. But as much as his body doesn’t react, not arching towards the new touch, his chest rises with another calm sigh. This is just being used to the mage when they’re this close, and isn’t reacting the same way he wouldn’t if he were moving his own arms. "I don’t know what I want. Or what I would do. But thinking about it… even with the best intentions I would likely see her blood, before giving her a chance.”

“Maybe you’d surprise yourself. You surprise me all the time.” Anders can feel the motion of that breath, keeping his face nestled in at the bend of Fenris’s waist. He calls Varania’s face to mind, and he remembers how stricken Fenris had been, that day. "Andraste’s breath, she loved you, Fenris. She looked the way you do when you’ve been given more heartbreak than you can hold. She was too ashamed to look you in the eye.“

Fenris flinches a scowl, less towards the words than the memories they rustle from some dark place he’d sent them to. "We are nothing alike. Not when she betrayed me. Let her be as horrified as she wants over what she’s done. Guilt is more than she deserves.”

Anders pulls away just slightly, peering up at Fenris with a shrewd gaze. "That leaves me with a question. If there were somehow two of you, and one of them – the you here, now – was left with the Fog Warriors and the other was taken on the ship with Danarius back to the life he knew in Tevinter… what would that other you have done, if Danarius commanded him to track you down and take you back?“

Fenris turns his head at that, at last. "It’s different. She knew, she could make the choice, but she still chose magic over me. Do you think I would turn you in if the templars promised me power?”

“Maybe she didn’t have as much of a choice as you think. She said as much. As for the Templars, what if they had you in their power? What if they threatened you with death, or threatened to return you to Tevinter somehow, if you didn’t betray me? And then insisted to you that they wouldn’t kill me, they only wanted to show me the error of my ways?” Anders sighs. "You still wouldn’t, would you. The stars would fall out of the sky and the sun would gutter out like a candle before you let harm come to me. So … maybe it is different, like you say. I simply… I think… the world needs less suffering, not more.“

The harsh tones fade, first draining from Fenris’ eyes before the rest of his expression follows, but it begins when Anders confirms his thoughts before he has to say a word, before he has to interrupt that he’d still never give the mage up so easily. Not when he’d seen what happened to Karl, and not when he didn’t trust most people farther than he could kick them. "Leave it then. It doesn’t matter what I intend when she’s long fled.”

“Anything that troubles you matters to me,” Anders replies.

 

“Everything, then?”

Anders grins slightly. "Everything.“

Fenris twitches an eyebrow higher, but even now he seems not wholly used to keeping hold of someone else’s gaze for quite so long, and his drop then turn outwards towards a bookshelf he’s not actually paying attention to. "Then why don’t you seem to be going as mad as I feel, sometimes.”

“Because I need to be present for you,” Anders answers. He shifts again, this time to pull himself upright, but his hands linger on Fenris’s hips. "Because when you’re hurt, I need to be there to give comfort, and when you’re frightened, I need to be there to give you courage. Just as you do for me.“

Fenris lets his head slump forward without looking, trusts that Anders’ chest will be there. When it is, his forehead coming to a stop as it leans to that supporting warmth and breath and rise and fall of bare skin he nuzzles against it, only enough to find a comfortable dip of muscle. And he says nothing, because what is there to be said that he didn’t already, just now.

Anders tightens his arms around Fenris, jus enough of a show of strength to prove he means it. His lips and chin rest on Fenris’s hair. He keeps just as silent, holding his lover, feeling content for once that simply being there says everything he meant to say.

At length, when Fenris sighs again the sound comes short and blunt, more frustrated than content. It was only a matter of time before that would build up again, with him, even though it remains weak from the heat tickling at his hair from Anders’ nose. "I should apologize. We can’t even drink together without it becoming something to be recovered from.”

“Perhaps we just need more practice.” Anders has a familiar wry tone in his voice, but he sounds optimistic. "You know I love you, right? You know that holding you close isn’t some kind of chore and never will be? I love having something, anything, that I can do for you…“

As much as Anders can’t see the tiny crease of a smile on his face, if it’s there at all, the expression bleeds into Fenris’ voice, edging it with a quiet humor. "I’d gathered as much. Seeing as you’re still here. And this.”

“Good,” Anders murmurs, making their embrace just a bit more snug with a wriggle of his body. "Since you were apologizing I wanted to make sure I was being clear on that. And thank you for the wine, love.“

"Mm.” It’s a small sound, barely louder than a mumble, before Fenris finally pulls away and straightens, eyes still focused on something else before he catches it and tentatively, though not shyly, looks up. “A pity I left it. There’s no game without it.”

Anders is, for once, remarkably unguarded. He seems wider-eyed, boyish in a way, when he’s not pulling back behind skepticism and wariness or simply hunkering down like a man who expects to take a beating. When Fenris mentions a game his expression brightens even further. "The bath’s not far. Let’s play, I’ll fetch.“ Anders clambers to his feet, stealing a kiss when the opportunity presents itself.

Fenris raises his chin to that kiss, finds himself straining forward before it’s simply gone, as Anders heads out the door. He tries to forget it, focus more instead on stretching his muscles as he works his feet under him and stands, settles out the small kinks in his joints from sitting on a stone floor and a rug that hardly helped. And though he’s not lost about it he certainly notices a faint chill with the mage gone, the sudden absence a ghost in the room, and he clamps his hands to his arms with a retreat to the bed faster than he’d care to admit.

Anders, on the other hand, is singing as he struts off naked into the hall. It’s apparently some kind of dwarven drinking song, though the words are hard to make out at all through the mage’s attrocious accent and the likelihood that he mistook the inebriated slurring of whoever he learned it from as part of the dialect. He stumbles over the chorus, then just goes back and repeats the verse he remembers, voice growing louder as he returns with the pair of wine bottles in one arm and a beaming smile on his face.

Fenris winces as Anders returns, a flinch that grows larger as the mage comes closer with that sound one could loosely call a song. For once he finds himself jealous of the cat, the ball of fur curled up in a corner of the room, as its ears easily flick back to shield itself and keep sleeping with barely a stir.  
Or its simply used to it, resigned to Fenris’ rants and Anders’ outbursts.  
Without being able to do much himself about it, Fenris scrunches his face as he reaches out for one of the bottles. "What is.. /that/?”

“Levity,” Anders answers. "You should try it sometime.“ He does not, however, attempt to sing another verse. He hands the fuller bottle over to Fenris and then sits himself down on the bed, pulling his legs up and nestling into the covers a bit while keeping upright. "So, what kind of game are we playing?”

 

“Evidently levity includes straining my ears.” But his voice doesn’t carry the venom of true disgust, more a simple snide remark placed without thought and more interested in the wine he’s quick to drink from. “The game Varric had us suffer through, when he managed everyone together. Only, us.” No audience to hide from, and no holding back. That’s the idea Fenris silently means behind those words, at least.

Anders nods then, pulling the blankets up around his shoulders like a cloak. “You first?” He lifts one arm, holding out the blanket-cloak to offer a warm place for Fenris to share.

Fenris shifts his weight to slide under the blanket at Anders’ side, as casual as he can possibly make it look to the point of almost trying too hard. But once he’s settled, starting to lean against the man’s shoulder with his own, his expression goes honest again, and with a pause to think up something. Something easy to start with. “You liked the barn cats more because the dogs knew what you were.”

“Drink, but not too much. I think the cats knew but didn’t care.” Anders smiles slantedly and takes a sip himself, just for the sake of craving the taste of wine on his tongue. He gazes off at the fire for a moment while he thinks. “You had a crush on Hawke for a while.”

Fenris tips his bottle to take a drink, but at Anders’ words the glass is turned farther, a bigger gulp before he pulls it away, and nearly coughs out, “You did too.”

Anders nods and drinks. “He was rather debonair about it too, even though he turned me down. For a while I thought he’d turned me down to chase after you and I was jealous enough I could’ve spat venom.” He shakes his head, a bit dismayed to realize at last just why thinking of Hawke and Fenris together had tweaked him off so badly. “You harbored some fantasies about Bethany too, I’d wager. Maybe even you sandwiched between both siblings…”

“Drink.” Fenris does too, as much as he commands, the glass rim pressed to his lips even when he’s finished, as he articulates the reply in his mind beforehand. “She was… nice, for a mage. But it hadn’t gotten that far. And my time was otherwise occupied. Are you sure that wasn’t your fantasy, not mine?”

Anders drinks, and drinks some more. “You’d have a harder time pinning down what fantasies I -haven’t- had.” There’s a long pause as Anders considers his next guess. He looks at Fenris a bit quizzically. “And speaking of stroke material… you don’t. Stroke, I mean.”

Fenris chokes immediately, caught unusually with a deepening blush across his cheeks, before he manages to look away. “I…” But there’s no casual excuse or brush off, not this time, so he just drinks before the silence gets too awkwardly long.

Anders’s eyebrows climb a goodly way up his forehead as he tries not to leer. “Now I’m surprised your balls really don’t glow blue. You’ve go… fortitude, that’s for certain. Your guess.”

Fenris finally manages to compose himself, at lease somewhat, straightening and closing his eyes momentarily to calm the hot flush on his face. “Why do you think I need to, with you around.” He knows what Anders meant, but it’s the best deflection he can come up with. “Your first time was with Karl.”

Anders pouts but drinks. “You -wish- you’d been the one to pop my cherry.”

Fenris cracks the smallest smile at that, the image flooding his mind for a fraction of a second. Though he comes to the conclusion that Anders is loud as it is without help. “It has novelty. But I can’t when the same goes for you.”

Anders shrugs, then drinks. “You’d have been more than my fragile sixteen-year-old frame could handle… but I would’ve died happy.”

Fenris drinks a small sip, in any case. “I can’t imagine it. Or, being fair, both of us.” Two virgins trying to fuck just seems like something horribly awkward and uncomfortable, enough that he waves a hand before he finishes his moment with the wine. “Change the subject, we wouldn’t be happy without a clue of what to do.”

Anders only grins his agreement, and then he’s lost in thought again, searching for another guess to make. "Kissing,“ he says. "It’s your favorite way to be given affection and your favorite way to show it.”

While Fenris pauses, honestly, then takes a drink, the moment is slow and his eyes are elsewhere in perplexed thought. When his wandering bears no answer he narrowly avoids choking on the wine, taking a too-heavy gulp before it spills down the wrong pipe, and looks back. “I hadn’t noticed. Is it?” He’d never felt here nor there about it, more a means to the end of exploring every last edge of the mage he could comfortably get his hands on.

“You do it very well.” Anders looks into Fenris’s eyes as he answers and feels the hold that green eyed gaze has on him. He takes a small drink from his own bottle and leans in, lips on Fenris’s lips, pressing with a gentle closure, tugging, parting, nearly panting. "Sweeter than anything,“ he murmurs.

Fenris is left blinking, dropping his bottle of wine heavy in his hand to his side, lightly resting against the mattress as he’s so simply and utterly caught. His lips remain parted as Anders drifts away, fearing that if he dared move he’d lose the feeling of that lightly teasing touch to his mouth, until his tongue goes dry enough that he’s forced to swallow. “You’re still asking me what applies to you.”

"I thought it was a good guess.” Anders can’t pull away without another kiss, so he gives one, then straightens a bit, wondering if Fenris can hear his heart hammering in his chest. "Considering all the times you’ve grabbed hold of me and stolen my breath away.“ He humms as he pauses, trying to think of something. "You don’t like the cold here in the south, do you. All these years and you’re not sure you’ll ever be used to how the winters are.”

Fenris composes himself to take another drink, fairly and not as hesitantly or ponderously as the last. “I don’t like the cold in the north, but neither did Danarius so I was spared, then.” Not like Hawke, who seems intent to run into the hills regardless of the weather. “I can’t imagine you’d feel differently, without those boots you wear.”

“No, I’d hate it myself,” Anders confesses. "Even with my boots on I’m not in love with winter weather. It’s one thing that’s kept me from trying to visit the Anderfels all these years. And I do believe it’s your turn to make a guess, love.“

“What don’t I know about you already..” With a small drop of his head Fenris looks towards the ceiling, silent and rummaging in his mind before he comes up with something. Something worth risking a drink over. But he stops right as he opens his mouth, and hauls himself upright to just take a drink of his own. “No, that would be going too far.”

Anders frowns quizzically. "Oh, lovely, now I -have- to know what it is. Tell you what… if you’re right, I’ll finish my bottle. If you’re wrong, you drink half of yours.”

Fenris goes quiet, debating, finds Anders’ gaze and watches him with a faint intensity for a few moments. Then, finally, he decides to just go for it. They can have a good laugh or sort it out themselves. “You were hurt over what I did with Justice because you’ll never be able to.”

Anders sits in silence for a moment, the idea hitting him so hard that he knows there’s something to it, he knows he must have been blinding himself to the thought. So now, he lets himself think it. "I hadn’t thought of it at the time, to be honest. I… if I kept a list of things I do my best not to think about, this would be on it. He means something to me… and it’s bittersweet. Love can only exist between two people, and Justice and I are not exactly that anymore. But it’s complicated, it’s confusing even to me.“ Anders feels his cheeks flushing even before he downs a mouthful of red wine. "I suppose you’re close enough to right.”

The answer raises the elf’s eyebrows. Fenris really hadn’t imagined it to be true, and at worst would make things awkward for them, and he takes a small sip all the same. “I imagine you could find a way to share. But it’s your turn.”

“Maybe. I’m not sure I see a point to it now. I’m in love with you. And I’m guessing… you aren’t as utterly certain that Justice is a demon, as you were when you first discovered what I am.”

Fenris smirks, though a bit humorlessly. “It sounds as if you’re under the impression that I think there’s anything but demons in the Fade.” But he drinks, lips wet and edged with a drop of wine spread between them before he brushes it away with the back of his hand. “I wouldn’t consider it knowing you if my opinion of him never changed.” And he cheats. “Couldn’t he take your hand?” It seems weak, but a fair enough consolation option.

“Take my h– Oh Maker, you mean to–” Anders turns almost as red as the wine staining his lips when he realizes what Fenris means. He coughs, then drinks to quell his coughing. "Yes, I… suppose that’s possible…“ His voice is meek, quiet, and with the tiniest, meekest hint of an echo. "You’re a bad influence, lover.”

“Pointing out the obvious is hardly being influential.” Fenris had wondered what the demon thought of this talk. But they were really past pretending that he wasn’t there when they’re alone, weren’t they. In an odd way he finds himself not minding the usually silent presence, always in the background but there, so perhaps Anders had been more correct than Fenris initially admitted to himself. “And I fail to see it being bad.”

“Maybe not bad, but certainly naughty. I guess it would be a bit like being bound…” Anders quickly takes another drink of wine. "I do want to know how you’d feel about something like… that whole idea.“

There’s a simple blink, Fenris halfway to pressing the wine to his lips again but stopping before the glass reaches him. "If you mean to ask my permission before you do anything with your own demon…”

“You’re my husband, of course I mean to ask.”

And Fenris resumes, the alcohol beginning to burn his throat hot and catch in his breath, distracting and retreating from that word he isn’t uncomfortable with so much as reeling when the floor of his mind takes a sharp shift and nearly knocks him over. “You’ve made your point that you’re a part of each other. I’m more curious in what he thinks.”

“He thinks I’m spoilt enough as it is with all the attention you give me.” Anders’s mouth quirks into a slanted smile. "He mostly thinks it’s -funny-. He says I don’t need a hand on my dick to tell me how much he cares. He tells me…“ Anders trails off, a look of surprise on his face. ”…we’re already intimate in the manner of Spirits… and anything to do with my body would lack the meaning that it has between you and me. It would only be ‘fun.’“

Fenris shakes his head, partly to himself, because no matter what level of effort he tries to put in Justice will never cease to be strange. "What we did was fun then?”

“It was and yet… more than that, because he isn’t already part of you.” Anders begins to scratch his head, thinking more or less what Fenris is, as a blue glow starts to infuse his eyes. "This is not an idea that had occurred to me,“ Justice says. "I will need to give it thought. But to do anything without taking your feelings into consideration is not what either of us would wish. You have every right to be arbitrary in this, Fenris.”

The elf looks up, meeting that glow with a faint glare. “It’s fine. Don’t insult me that I might think otherwise and so easily betray him.”

“I meant no disrespect.” Justice bows his head politely and retreats, leaving Anders there, blushing and feeling supremely awkward.

The stern look is diverted the moment Anders is back, a sword deflected before the blow. “That was.. harsher, than I’d intended. I hope you understand.” And he does mean Anders though there’s an apology knitted into his words, as much in the background as Justice is, that he understands why this is so important enough that Fenris snapped.

Anders has to spend a moment in thought before he can begin to guess at what’s behind Fenris’s words. At length, though, he nods, and draws Fenris close, resting his forehead against Fenris’s brow. "I think so. It’s alright.“ His voice is tender, his eyes bright and warm. 

Fenris stays relatively still for a few lingering moments, shoulders relaxing under the mage’s fingers. But then something occurs to him, or perhaps he simply realizes how placid he’s been this entire time, because he turns his head towards one of the dressers with a small flick of movement, the same sort of turn as if he’d heard something, though not wary of what it might be. With careful movements he turns his head back to extricate himself from Anders’ grasp, then slinks out from the bed and it’s warm covers. “Wait.” As he straightens he pauses, expecting Anders to try to follow anyway before he turns his attention back towards the dresser, wine momentarily forgotten as it’s left with an absent pass of the hand towards the bedside table. The doors are swung open indelicately, each handle in each hand, and there’s nothing. Well, nothing that would make a sound, just various clothes that had been left behind so long ago. Everything hanging is shoved to one side as Fenris rummages, and then he must have found what he was looking for because he reaches in and hauls a long, wide roll of an animal skin out, then tucks it under one arm as he returns to unfurl the thick layer of fur across the bed.

With Fenris’s sudden alertness, Anders also sits upright, looking around. It wouldn’t be the first time Fenris has heard or spotted something he himself hasn’t noticed. He’s about to rise from the bed, finally understanding why Fenris tends to keep his smalls on at all times, when the elf tells him to stay. When Fenris unrolls the fur, Anders watches with a wide, approving smile. "I can’t say I minded the thought of the two of us having to fuck for warmth on a nightly basis, but this is /lovely/…”

With the hide spread out neatly, with seemingly no effort, Fenris sinks back into the bed at Anders’ side, close though he doesn’t outright lean to as he had been. “A nightly basis? Why do I get the feeling that it could be sweltering and it would make no difference?”

“Probably because you’re right.” Anders’s grin turns a bit sheepish, and then, remembering their game, he drinks from his bottle of wine. "I don’t remember whose turn it is, but if it’s mine….“ He makes a bit of a show of pondering over his guess. "You’d like to fuck again before we sleep.”

With his wine set down and much too far away Fenris reaches for the neck of Anders’ bottle, catching it with a couple fingers to coax a small drink from it while the mage is still holding the body. “That doesn’t count, it’s both obvious and something you want.”

“Well, what -do- you want that I don’t, or that you think I don’t? I didn’t expect the fact that I’d do almost anything to please you to make this game so blasted hard.” Anders helps tilt the bottle to Fenris’s lips even though he wears a surly pout for a moment.

Fenris glances up, close and wine threatening to escape from the corners of his lips until he lightly tips the bottle away. “Then we’ll make this simple. You can ask me anything you want, before I /do/ anything you want.”

“That makes it easy. I want to know who your lovers were. I want to know if you grieved the Fog Warriors. I want to know if you ever miss having sex with Isabela… and what was -that- like, by the way? I want to know how things were for you while you were on the run, I want to know what you think of all our companions, if there’s anything you ever daydreamed about, if you’ve ever wanted a…” Anders trails off and smiles a bit, shaking his head. "That’s probably going a little too far. But there isn’t anything about you I don’t want to know. If I hold back it’s because I don’t want to tear open any old wounds you’re still trying to mend.“

Fenris pulls away to straighten his back and sit up, eyes drawn back but unfocused to somewhere distant, the shift at first stiff, but then he draws up his knee and his shoulders lose their tense formation, and hang forward with his head. His chin tips downward, a somber and faint downward curving edge to his lips, but when his hair follows and drops, locks of white hair obscuring his vision, he jerks his head back up to knock it back out of the way. But he’s still quiet, and despite not looking horribly pained, not like he has before, the pause draws long and it becomes unclear whether he’ll actually answer or not when he finally tries to begin. "Isabela was.. distracting. It was easier not to think.. or, simply not dwell on them. But that didn’t solve anything.” It felt odd, truly thinking about it, and back to their game with Varric and him admitting that he loved their fights. It felt cleansing, ridding himself of it, and while Isabela was surely tolerant of his outbursts it was more taking hits at the water, and she would moree wait for him to relax instead of Anders, facing it head on. “Before her… it depends on your definition.”

Anders acknowledges that with a sober nod. “But you were never just… violated outright? Maker, I don’t even know how much different it is, just being commanded to is horrible enough to think about. I know you’ll tell me that you didn’t know any differently then, but… how do you feel about it now?”

There’s a small shake of Fenris’ head, minute and an absent side effect of his thoughts along with a small curl of a snarl to his lip, and both are short lived. “I hated it. As much as I did then. But not for the reasons you’re thinking. I was.. /jealous/.”

“Jealous of what? Or of whom?” Anders is calm and attentive as he listens. He shifts closer to where Fenris sits, pulling the fur up around his shoulders.

Fenris parts his lips but visibly stops, closes his jaw as he looks down, and decides to shuffle things together a bit more coherently, start from the beginning, just rush it out the door without wondering what Anders will think of him or the berating he imagines he’ll get, because he goes through the words he’d say if it were someone else all the time. "Mages in Tevinter summon demons as a means to an end… sometimes they get to know each other. They weren’t friends, or slaves…“ The contently employed, perhaps, but Fenris doesn’t venture those details, "Danarius knew Urge and Carnality. And they lasted far longer than he did.”

Anders’s brow furrows while he deciphers Fenris’s meaning. Then he blanches. “He threw you to his demons? That’s inhuman!”

Fenris nearly chokes, a sound churning out oddly mixed between a growl and a snort of amusement. “Throw would be.. a poor choice of words.”

“Well… what, then?” Anders wears a look on his face between confusion and compassion. “Tevinter’s a strange place, isn’t it. The more you tell me about it the more certain I am I’d feel lost there.”

And then Fenris does grin, a little, not nostalgic but that perhaps the mage will begin to realize what the slave ran away from, only to stumble into somewhere completely different.  
Well, not entirely. The elves hadn’t done much to change their situation despite having less people directly ordering them about.  
“I knew them as much as he did, standing at his side. Urge was.. the lesser of the two, rougher in everything he did. Danarius only let Carnality near me, if he insisted on watching. It wasn’t entirely a punishment..”

“Then that’s what you meant when you asked me if I’d ever fucked a demon. Because you had.” Anders tilts his head. While sober, there’s nothing angry or even especially disgusted in his expression while he mulls that over. “It sounds cold, if not exactly cruel. Like something to drive a wedge between sex and affection.”

Fenris shrugs, completely noncommittal. “I don’t pretend to guess the deeper thoughts behind Danarius’ actions. Carnality… I didn’t exactly need to worry about what he wanted. As far as I was concerned any debts between us were paid, and he was strong but not completely unkind.”

Anders nods. “Intentional or not, it’s always sounded like your life before was cold and lonely. I’m glad you’re here, now… if that wasn’t already obvious.”

“Does it? We had.. moments. But they were far separate things than what went on with the demons.”

Anders flops onto his side, one hand still around the bottle of wine to keep it from spilling. He lies there, loosely curled, the soft fur pelt Fenris placed on the bed pulled up to his ear. “So, did you have a lover when you were with the Fog Warriors?”

Fenris looks over, reaches out to pick the bottle out of Anders’ grip to finish the bottle. Not that there was much left, at this point, though it takes him as many gulps as seconds. “No, though there was one that.. understood me. Were you hoping I had?”

“I thought you might have. I’m not sure if I hoped you had. I thought it might have been better for you, than what you’d had with Danarius.”

Fenris shakes his head, the motion quick and hasty as he leans over to set the empty wine bottle onto the floor beside the bed. “It wasn’t the time. I..wouldn’t have wanted the correct things.”

“What would those be?” Anders holds up one arm, lifting the edge of the blankets to invite Fenris in.

Fenris sinks in, and closer, to drop at Anders’ side with knit brows and to make a small pained groan now, for this, and not for the rest of what he’d been telling. “Freedom can be a terrible thing. I’m not sure what I imagined when Danarius left me there, but in days not having anything to do was driving me mad. I didn’t want a friend.”

Anders wraps his arms around Fenris and kisses him impulsively. “And while you were on the run, there was nobody? That’s a long dry spell.” He sounds sympathetic rather than disbelieving. He’s been through it himself, not for want of willing partners, but for knowing he was in no condition to be anyone’s lover.

“Mm. I didn’t have time. It’s a long way here from the Imperium’s borders, if I lingered anywhere longer than a few days everyone was more interested in reporting an elf than sleeping with him.”

“Poor judgment on their parts, then. A night with you is worth more than any bounty Danarius could put on your head.”

Fenris rolls his eyes, and when they come down from the crest they close and he presses his head closer to the pillow. “Well good to know I’m expensive then.”

“One might even say priceless.” Anders grins, his hand wandering down to the small of Fenris’s back and past it to cup his rear. “And to think you cut your teeth on a desire demon…no wonder you’re phenomenal. Come to think of it, is there anything you do that you’re not exceptional at? Swordsmanship, languages, fucking, music, dance…”

Fenris jumps, a small jerk as he arches his back to prop his front onto his elbows, and give Anders a narrow eyed look. “Not quite as exceptional at bending the truth like you do.”

“I’m not,” Anders says. “And while I -am- flattering you, I’ve never had to exaggerate much to do it.”

Fenris drops back down, arms crossing and spreading onto the pillow in front of him. “I’m only exceptional at one of those things, mage.”

“That’s not true, even Hawke agrees you’re a fine swordsman.” Anders’s eyes glint mirthfully at what he implies.

“If I’m so exceptional, why is it nobody I’ve met has been lacking in talent?”

“Because it takes an awful lot of effort and talent and other such things to catch your eye. By the time somebody gets into your incredibly tight leggings, they really, -really- mean it.”

“Other such things?” But the elf stops, and adds barely after the last question ends, “Did you just compliment yourself in your own explanation?”

Anders blinks. “If I did I’m sure I didn’t mean to. Damn, come to think of it I did. I think my case is more of a fluke, or just a testament to the virtue of persistence.” Anders blushes uncomfortably and hunkers down under the blankets. “But you -are- exceptional…”

Fenris sighs, the hiss of air escaping his nose drawing out and by the sounds of it a long time coming. “You never listen..” He props himself up, again, and this time pulls closer to Anders, hooks an arm across the mage’s shoulders as he meets their lips together, his pressing and heavy and letting the weight drain from his shoulders into the act.

Anders accepts the kiss with a willing moan, opening his lips to invite in Fenris’s tongue. His hands meet at the small of Fenris’s back and he holds him close and tight. When the kiss breaks, he murmurs, “I’ll listen if you will.”

Fenris meets Anders eyes then drops, his forehead stopping at the man’s lips, his own lips still parted and breathing hot on the crook of neck under him. “Everything.. what you say, the way you look at me, even the things that annoy me, or anger me. There’s this.. purpose and surety. It only hurts me when you hesitate.”

Anders shuts his eyes. He can feel Fenris’s smooth brow against his lips, and Fenris’s warm breath pooling in the hollow of his throat. the sound of his voice adds extra weight to his words as they sink into him, and Anders tries to stamp them in his memory indelibly. "Before you, I think I never truly knew what it was to be loved by someone. There is so much I never expected from anyone that you give to me unstintingly. I’ve seen in you… someone so strong and proud, even though he faces his greatest fears almost daily. You stand up to it with grace and calm.“

Anders’ neck cools as Fenris’ breath at it falters, noticed more harshly when it’s absent. Then he sighs, a brief and amused if choked sound. "I haven’t accomplished any of those things. No.. rather, I only bear feeble attempts. That part of me is there, that fears you.”

“Bravery doesn’t mean not feeling fear. It means being willing to face it when you do.” Anders echoes that sigh, his arms wound tight around Fenris’s waist and the palms of his hands smooth along the contours of Fenris’s strong back. “I… I don’t fear you like I used to. I know you could end me, but I also know you won’t. I love being vulnerable with you… feeling your strength, feeling powerless against you… Something about knowing you have the strength to make me helpless but that you wouldn’t use that strength to harm me.”

Fenris shifts his elbows, lowering as his hands find a gentle grip to Anders’ shoulders, then rolls off and pulls the man bodily on top of him, and lifts his head in a small strain to catch the small curve of Anders’ adam’s apple in his mouth, tongue grazing over the skin between his lips. “I know you won’t” But simply knowing isn’t the rational part of him that he’s fighting.

“Then I’ll go on not harming you, and the part that won’t listen will figure it out someday.” Anders settles comfortably on Fenris, his weight keeping them pressed tightly together, and the elf’s body feeling supple and firm and smooth against his skin. He comes as close to wedging his forearms under Fenris as he can as he tilts his head back, his bare throat stretched for Fenris’s kisses.


	41. Chapter 41

Perhaps the worst part about the fight was the fact that none of it was expected when they’d gotten out of bed midmorning, shrugged their clothes on, and joined Hawke and Merrill to face her demon. At worst they would have to kill a blood mage, and regardless of what he knew about the elf Fenris didn’t much care about that outcome. While a part of him felt heartless for that sentiment, she brought it upon herself.  
But then everything had gone wrong. The dead body they’d left in the cave wasn’t Merrill. It wasn’t blood mages or abominations or demons falling under Fenris’ sword, but elves, as they fought their way in a struggle just to escape.  
And still he made it seem easy. The people attacking him were ‘his people’, were as trodden as he was and stumbled backwards once he was too close for their bows, but he still cut them down, no hesitation to his fluid movements. This wasn’t running from slavers, or falling back to let mercenaries take the brunt of it, everything burned away the only way it can when cornered, to a simple ‘kill them’.  
He does. Efficiently.

Anders feels sick to his stomach. There’s no time to give any heed to that feeling of something gone irretrievably wrong, which might be this battle’s one saving grace. But even so, Anders can’t quite think of it as “just another fight." He casts his spells with restraint, concentrating on holding enough open ground around himself to swing his staff. A blast of power, and two Dalish hunters closing on him are knocked back, reeling from the shockwave. He’s still looking into the dazed eyes of one of them when Hawke finishes her. She still seems confused as she drops to her knees, and Anders has seen that look before. Hawke is a paradoxically gentle killer. Just one piercing stab under the ribs, into the heart, from a blade so sharp she must barely feel it. Swift, decisive, pragmatic, as kind as it’s able to be. The second hunter falls as well, hitting the ground with a muffled impact and an acquiescing sigh, just as Anders hears bowstrings snap taut and watches another volley of arrows arc towards them. 

The heavy sword in Fenris’ hands swings faster than it ought to each time, while Anders may have gotten used to seeing the elf’s speed, while Hawke seems to absolutely make use of it in his own follow through, the tribe has never seen it, don’t know how to react when logic says they should have more time to. The long hammered edge drowns in a deep red soon enough, sprays the excess onto Fenris as he raises it to swat back the wave of arrows, follows through to catch an archer in the chest, but the elf tries to duck only to take the sword in the neck instead. They both crumple and tumble aside, and Fenris ignores both as he moves past.  
There’s a sound of anger, not a voice Fenris recognizes but also not from where he expected anyone to be. He both spins around and carries his weight towards the new direction, sees the young hunter that had decided to hide behind a large carved stone in the fray. He’s picked up an arrow from the ground but he’s too far away, and no matter how fast he runs forward or moves his sword it feels like molasses, and he’s knocked to a halt with a heavy punch to the gut. Fenris drifts on his momentum, his steps unsteady but he still manages to close the distance, a sloppy swing that looks more rightfully heavy. The other elf falls, not dead but soon, and Fenris slows to a stop and the end of his sword plows into the soft earth, the only thing steady and holding him upright as blood spills around the arrow sticking out of his gut.

Everything seems to happen at once. Anders draws up a barrier to protect himself from the incoming arrows. Hawke slips under the arc of the volley only for one of the hunters’ daggers to catch the back of his knee, and just as splintering arrows shower Anders he’s trying to focus on knitting Hawke’s hamstring back together. He’s aware of Merrill, whether he tries to be or not. He can feel her magic flare in stuttering bursts, hesitant and frantic all at once. But when he lifts his head to check the way forward, the path Fenris is cutting for them, he sees his lover leaning on the pommel of his massive sword.   
There are bodies between them. Just bodies, and soon less that that as Anders surges forward with fire pouring from his hands. Dalish hunters scream and fall, and the air stinks of burning, charring flesh and hair. Anders doesn’t realize he’s screaming until he hears himself, just roaring without words, with only outrage. Doubts burn away, hesitation crumbles like dead ashes, and all that matters is ending the fight quickly. With a lunge, he jabs the end of his staff into the gut of the nearest Dalish. Lightning bursts from the elf’s midsection and arcs to those behind, and then those behind them, launching each combatant it hits off of their feet, into the turf.

Fenris can feel it, knows it and tells himself to keep moving. He’s been shot before, in the arm, or the base of his shoulder, knows the burning acidic heat and the uneasy feeling of something deeply lodged where it’s not supposed to be, triggering a slippery touch that shifts with his every move, that’s more sickening than the sight of it.  
After the small stall out he hauls back to life, forcing the adrenaline to keep pressing him on, at least enough to lurch forward and finish the man that shot him, though he manages to turn with a swipe, the sword swinging as slow as it should but still hitting it’s burning target and cutting them down before they fall. And that’s when the stench hits him, too overwhelming with the stink of cooking hair, muscle, organs, too close to what he remembers of the ritual and he falters again, to stave off a wave of nausea. The gag of his stomach cuts the arrow deeper and he chokes, head dropping, but he finally comes to a stop and stays put only when it’s obvious that there’s nobody else alive near enough to attack.

The hunters hesitate. So many have fallen that it’s becoming apparent which way this fight will resolve. But there are weapons raised, there are arrows nocked, and Anders isn’t finished yet. He kicks away the smoldering corpse of the elf he just skewered with lightning and gestures with his staff, sending one fireball after another to chase the retreating Dalish back into the trees. Anger always makes fire feel easy – treacherously, tantalizingly easy, and by the time his volley ceases, Anders himself is almost burning with rage, sweat dripping down his face and wetting his blonde hair. With the hunters routed, Anders wheels, his staff slung across his back in a smooth motion as he reaches for Fenris with a stricken call. “HAWKE! Get his other arm, don’t let him fall! Lean on me now, love.” Anders slips one arm under Fenris’s shoulder and around his back.

It’s when his arm is buffered under Anders’ shoulder, the frantic energy from the fight cooling in his veins that the pain hits, white and searing and a point too close to the underside of his spine. Fenris makes another choking sound as Hawke follows suit on his other arm, saliva catching in his throat, and his grip on his sword begins to loosen. As nauseous as the pain and the smell makes him he manages a dazed glance at their surroundings, as he could have sworn there were more people moments ago, only to find the scorched bodies littered on the damp mossy grass. “Why didn’t you do that to begin with…bloody mage..” Could have saved him an arrow’s worth of trouble.

“Shut up,” Anders snaps. Hawke watches the healer and follows his cues, helping Anders ease Fenris to the ground. “There’s no way that wound won’t be septic.” Anders scowls when he sees how deep the shaft of the arrow is in Fenris’s gut. With one hand he flips open the pouch at his belt, pulls out a vial, and unstoppers it with his teeth, spitting the cork onto the grass. “Drink this,” he says, practically shoving the mouth of the vial to Fenris’s lips. “And don’t move.” He puts his other hand to the wound and carefully presses, trying to stanch some of the bleeding as much as get a sense for where the arrowhead is in Fenris’s body. Merrill hovers over the other three, tentative footsteps carrying her closer. Even if he weren’t absorbed in his task Anders would likely have never noticed her silent footfalls.

The sword is finally dropped, landing with a thud on the soft ground, the smell of trampled and muddied green mixing with all the other horrible smells in the air, all amplified in the elf’s nose by the wound nausea. Fenris flinches, a small bodily jerk against any touch that moves the arrow, and gulps his throat down before swallowing whatever Anders has given him, drops of it edging an escape from the corners of his lips. He’s too distracted to care. Though he fully manages to glare, silent, instinctively suspicious from years of being held down to spread magic over his worse wounds.

Anders puts one hand on Fenris’s hair, the other kept in place at the arrow’s shaft. “Of all the places they could put a bloody arrow,” he mutters. For the moment, he waits, his face severe, for the potion to take effect. His magic is present as a calm, controlled flow, cycling through Fenris’s body and leeching any sepsis from his blood, giving him warmth, giving him life to replace the blood he’s lost and is still losing. The reality of who he’s healing and not just what begins to encroach on his mind and his throat tightens up. His fingers card through Fenris’s silver hair as he forces himself to swallow.  
“I can help,” comes a quiet, melodious voice. Merrill sinks to her knees by Fenris’s head.  
Anders shoots her a glare. “Hating to think of all this fresh blood going to waste, are you? Void take you and your ‘help’, this is -your- fault!”  
“I know!” Merrill’s shout overlaps Anders’s snarl. “But I can help!”  
She isn’t pleading, even though Anders can see the guilt in her eyes and the tearstains on her face. “It doesn’t make up for anything.” In the back of his mind, Anders glances to Justice for confirmation, but the spirit’s presence is strangely quiescent, aside from their shared anxiety over Fenris. Wasn’t Merrill guilty? Wasn’t her punishment just?  
“There’s no making up for lives lost,” Merrill says. “So let’s not lose another.”  
“No blood magic.”

Even with a promise of no blood magic Anders was already one mage too many, and Fenris growls out, “You’ve done enough.” It may be against his better judgement as his hand digs into the loose dirt, the coiling muscles trailing up his shoulders, gaze snapping to Merrill with a lucid intensity only fueled by the gentle numbness setting in at his side. His breathing is hidden under the plate of armor covering his chest but it goes quiet and steadily faster, with a controlled calm, and one of his heels leans into the ground, slowly, large loose rocks under the thin layer of soil creaking, shifting his weight on his good side. He’s not tied down, and that might be a bad thing, as he looks torn between springing backwards or attacking anyone else for coming too close.

“Merrill, keep watch. If the hunters return you have better odds of spotting them than I do.” Hawke pulls back to give Fenris breathing room. What he thinks about the situation he keeps hidden under his familiar game face. If Merrill is disappointed, it barely registers against the anguish of the day, and she stands up, steps away to watch the trees and listen.  
“/Stop moving./” Anders lifts his hand from Fenris’s head to rub away a drip of sweat hanging at the end of his nose. “I’m going to have to pull the arrow free,” he says. “And if you tense it will make things worse. I need you to trust me. I need you to close your eyes, Fenris.”

So much easier said than done. Fenris eases, warily, as Hawke and more importantly Merrill back off, though his breathing is still tense and stilted. As he watches Hawke stand and decide to take post with Merrill, the murmuring between them about what they should do with the remaining elves blocking their path, he swallows and shakes his head. For several long moments he focuses, jaw taught and defined as he mentally crowbars his midsection looser, first the flinching wounded muscle of his flank, followed by the very conscious uncoiling of his stomach, and following with the muscles in his back though he’s unsure of just how far the arrow has pierced him. “Do it.”

Anders pulls the arrow the second the words leave Fenris’s mouth. One violent tug and the barbed head pulls free, dripping with gore. Anders drops the arrow as if it were a viper to put his hand back to that wound, and he can feel Fenris’s blood welling against his palm, hot and sticky. He nearly gags, nearly sobs, but he fights against both impulses to pour his magic into Fenris and not think about how likely it is this wound would have killed the elf if he hadn’t been present to heal him. It still could. The work is delicate but Anders mends torn guts and wounded stomach as quickly as he can.

The sound that chokes out from the elf’s throat has no voice but it’s deep all the same, from the same place the arrow rips from inside him, wet and loud and 'cough’ means nothing to describe it as his whole chest heaves with the outburst. After the violent expulsion he freezes, hunched over, lets the pain subside no matter how faintly, then his hand snakes out to catch the one on his wound, digs against Anders’ wrist with his gauntlet but no more than uncomfortably. “…/stop/.”

That plea makes Anders clench his teeth. He feels the rims of his eyes burning, watches his vision cloud, but he can’t pause even to reply. He doesn’t stop. More sweat beads on his face, ashen as if he were the one losing blood, while he goes on forcing the wound to knit.

Fenris digs his grip tighter, his hand hawklike, pinsharp talons sinking a firm grasp and pulls up, roughly, not willing to say it twice, and lifts his head to glare at Anders. Not his normal, silently growling at everything look as he usually wears but something harsher, an edge of betrayal escaping past the pain. And he looks down at the blood covering his front, black and sticky and hotly radiating from the wound on his clothes, then looks up to where Hawke and Merrill are watching for any renewed attack. “What are we going to do about them?” His words sound far less agonized than he let on with his eyes, only a faint tone allowed to mar the sound, and he does well to ignore that he’s still bleeding.

“/Fine./” Anders lets his hand drop away, unable to even hide that he’s panting for breath. There’s still a bloody gouge in Fenris, but the deeper wounds are mended as well as he can manage. “Same bloody thing we’ve been doing, if they’re stupid and obstinate enough to come back.” Anders begins to unwind a roll of bandages from his pouch. “And if you ever ask me not to heal you again when you’ve been gutshot? I will fucking well -slap you- before I ignore you and heal you anyway.”

Fenris lets go the moment Anders pulls at pointed steel trap of his hand, mechanical and snapping open, then lets his hand drop to cover where the mage had been healing him moments ago. He’s left watching warily, but visibly relaxes, if stiffly, as Anders reaches for the strips of cloth instead. But it doesn’t mean he didn’t catch the tone, though his own is tired. “Damn mage, argue with me later.”

“You bet I will,” Anders mutters. He gently nudges Fenris’s hand out of the way to press a clean rag to the wound. “Hold this in place for me, I’ll get the wound bound and we can get off this freezing bloody elf-ridden mountain.” He begins to wind the bandage around Fenris’s midsection, and soon the wrap is holding pressure on the wound on its own.

Annoyingly Fenris is finally completely compliant, helps press the wrappings in place when he needs to and provides no resistance, as if he wasn’t being a stubborn ass moments ago. He breathes out as they tighten the dressing, takes a sharp and testing gasp of air in when the loose ends are tied in place, satisfied with the pressure and reaches for his sword. But mainly he just uses it to dig the end into the dirt, uses it as a prop as he winces and forces himself to stand. A tiny smirk crosses his lips, even as he works to steady himself, lifts the sword to balance if nothing else, though it pulls at all the wrong muscles and sends dulled pain shooting through his midsection. “Lead the way, then, if you’re so eager.”

Anders watches Fenris pull himself to his feet with an incredulous look on his face. He stands up, unable to keep from frowning in stormy disapproval. “You idiot. Put that sword down and if you’re honestly thinking of hiking back to Kirkwall, forget about it.” He takes Fenris by the wrist and ducks under his arm. then, looping one arm around Fenris’s back and hitching the other below the elf’s knees, he scoops Fenris up in his arms. “Hawke?! We’re ready, if you can get Fenris’s greatsword.”

Hawke turns around, a defensive half-turn to keep the corner of his eyes downhill, just in time to see Fenris make a surprised sound at being so suddenly and completely ineffectual. Moreso than he was already, anyway. The immediate tension driving his body softens, Hawke edges in and lifts the pommel of the sword out of the elf’s reach, Fenris’ hand closing to a tight fist with nothing to hold onto before it simply gives in, and he ignores Hawke’s light mutter about the weapon being damn heavy as he leans his head to Anders’ chest. It would be so easy to just fall asleep, their current situation such a nagging distraction. One he’d had intents to be a part of. “…bastard.”

“I love you, too.” Anders’s reply is wry but also tender in equal measure. He adjusts his hold on Fenris, mainly as an excuse to snuggle him and gather a bit of reassurance for himself. Fenris is alive and warm and likely to mend from this if they can get back to Kirkwall. Anders is still warm from exertion, even though the chill mountain air has finally taken the sweat off his face. He has, however, smelled better, and he wrinkles his nose in distaste when he catches a whiff from his own collar. He’ll be cleaning more than Fenris’s wound when they get home.

—–

There’s sounds, yelling, sure, and he swears he had his eyes open for it, but there’s a blur of chaos Fenris is barely aware of, and when he realizes his eyes are closed he opens them and looks out to Hightown, and glances around from the corner of his eye, how did they get there so bloody fast. Merrill is gone, and Hawke is too far away, turning the corner to home.  
And then the pain hits, a sledgehammer so hard he jerks, tries to double over before he realizes he’s still being carried, and fights off a heavy wave of nausea that leaves him shuddering and coughing.

“Fenris.” Anders murmurs acknowledgement as he feels the warrior jerk and shudder awake in his arms. “We’re almost home.” He lengthens his strides. Fenris’s sleep had been a mercy, and now that he’s awake, Anders wants him back where he can tend to him. Here in the streets, he can’t use his magic if it’s needed, not without being clapped in irons for his trouble.

“I realized.” It’s a small grumble as he settles in Anders’ arms again, not completely bereft of the attitude even in the middle of trying not to die. “The Dalish…?” Anything he can focus on, as a sort of seasickness at rocking in the mage’s strides sinks in, and he’d beg to stand on solid ground but every cough had spurred the muscle in his side with stabs of pain… there was just no way until they got home.

“They fled. By the time we made it down the mountain even the aravels were gone.” The sounds of the streets begin to mute to a murmur as Anders turns a corner. It isn’t long before they’re in the shadow of Fenris’s mansion, and Anders shifts the way he cradles Fenris so he can get a hand on the doorknob. When he opens the door, he’s surprised to find it silent and dark within, when ostensibly Merrill and Hawke had gone on ahead to ask Orana for help. Ser Mewins scampers up, mewling for his supper and confirming the manor has been empty all day.

Fenris barely notices if at all, and less the fact that it’s empty and more the sounds the cat is making as it chatters about how terribly it’s day went, and does it’s damned best to trip Anders over by doing figure eights around his legs. “Well enough… ” After a couple moments of silence save the cat, the incessant cat, he does his best to glare down at the furball, while it trots out in front, still meowing. “I’m not dead yet.”

Anders places his feet carefully, nudging his tabby out of the way time and again as he makes his way, slowly, to the stairs. “Ser Mewins, if you want me to step on your paws, just keep doing what you’re doing,” he mutters. Then he starts up the stairs and the cat races ahead, just to stand at the landing and mew some more, helpfully informing Anders that he is headed -away- from the food dish.

For any cat person it would be obvious. But to Fenris, it’s all foreign, the cats in Tevinter were largely quiet, and for all he can understand it’s prancing around them and announcing the celebration that the only person who doesn’t think it’s absolutely adorable is about to kick the bucket. The elf groans, part from the cat and part from the ache piercing halfway through him, and that the mansion is swimming, and buries his head against the feathers and thick material of Anders’ coat, warm at his chest.

Anders holds Fenris a little tighter, as if affection would make any difference given the wound he’s suffered. Soon enough, they’re in the bedroom, and Anders lays Fenris down on their bed. “Let me get the fire lit,” he says, as Mewins interrupts with a particularly long, adamant plea. “…and the cat fed.” He unbuckles his coat and lays it over Fenris, reluctant to get any more blood on the bedclothes than he has to. “And don’t you dare move from that spot, even if you managed to get upright you’ve lost too much blood to stay that way.”

Fenris growls out a small sound, deep in his throat, full of frustration with all the energy in the world but too chained down in place by his body to vent any of it. And as he’s shifted to the bed something more familiar sets, a throb at one temple, but he knows it’ll spread across his skull. The nausea, it’s new, but the headache he knows, the general misery of losing too much blood at once. He winces his eyes shut, brows knit tightly in place with a heavy snarling furrow. “And argue, you can’t forget that one.”

Anders responds with a short, quiet chuckle. “There’s no power in Thedas that could stop you from arguing when you’ve got your mind set on it. I’m not optimistic enough to think you’d refrain just because I told you to.” He looks up over his shoulder to cast a glance back at Fenris while he tries to stir sparking kindling to a blaze. “I’ll have you warm and in less pain soon, just be still a few minutes more.”

There’s a small shot of adrenaline at those words, erasing all the pain at once far faster than anything else could for a moment, and Fenris digs his hands into the bed, metal tips of his gauntlets sending far ripples into the sheets as they flex and his shoulders try to push him back a few inches on their own. And his snarl becomes real as his eyes crack open, the pained frustration fading to a defensive wariness. “Don’t touch me.”

With the fire starting to kindle properly, Anders rises to his feet, looking down at the snarl on Fenris’s face. His expression becomes flat and neutral. “I can’t do that. I think you know why.” He turns his back and scoops up the small tabby that continues to circle his legs, mewling. “I’ll be back in a minute.” He leaves the room with Ser Mewins tucked under one arm.

Fenris glares as Anders leaves, and alone he glances around, searching, a small panic setting in as he realizes his sword is gone and there’s not a sharp object in sight. Then he stops himself, with a moment of clarity reminding that killing one’s lover isn’t exactly the best idea he’s ever come up with. But he has no other plans, beyond an overwhelming need to get away even when he fully realizes he can’t. He pulls up a leg on his good side, presses the heel into the bed to try pushing himself into any kind of desperate movement, but even while he gets at least partly upright against the pillows and headboard, the motion tightens a muscle in his stomach, and chokes him with a small shout. What a mess he’s gotten himself into, can’t even crawl away.

Anders isn’t gone long. He takes the stairs two at a time in his hurry to get back to Fenris’s side, and when the door swings open, he stands there with bread, milk, and a bottle of strong whiskey. He takes stock of the position Fenris is in and his neutrality falters. “What the hell are you trying to do?”

And it’s a very good question, enough of one that Fenris comes to his senses, before he remembers why he panicked in the first place and clouds his mind again, leaving him somewhat the awkward but cornered tiger on the bed, breathing quick and shallow but with purpose. “Irrum-.. what does it /look/ like I’m doing.”

“Something foolish, that’s what.” Anders sits down on the foot of the bed and sets the bread and milk beside him. He unstoppers the bottle of whiskey and pours a fair ammount of it into an earthen cup. “Care for a drink before you head out?” He holds the cup out to Fenris at arm’s length, giving him a skeptical stare.

The elf glances down to the whiskey, back to Anders’ eyes before he reaches out, still on edge and cautious but taking the alcohol all the same, shrinks back as soon as he has a clear grip on the cup to drink as much as he can manage in one shot. “Just going to wait until I fall asleep, then?”

“I was hoping it would help with the pain, but why take a mage’s word for it.” He lets Fenris take the cup, and then holds out the bottle to offer a refill. Though he suspects Fenris will simply swipe that as well. “Fenris. You know this is me, yes? This is me here, talking to you, and I’m not going to hurt you.”

That’s something that needs to be debated now, and it’s right there in his eyes as he watches Anders from the rim of his cup. It goes empty soon enough, but he leaves it hovering in the air near his lips. “I know? I know you want to make it all better, and you didn’t stop.”

“You had a septic abdominal wound. If that’s not blunt enough for you, your /shit/ was seeping into your /blood/. You would be dead by now if I had stopped healing when you told me to.” Anders levels a hard stare at Fenris. “I’d rather have had you live to spurn me than that. If you want rid of me, I’ll do as you wish. I’ll suture you and be gone.” He turns his face away, casting a stony glare at the far wall, trying to hide the way everything wants to tighten and twist at the thought. He tells himself what he told himself to get through the past few hours. This isn’t really happening. If he just rides it all out, everything will be alright again soon.

And there Fenris is, still draped in Anders’ coat despite his pathetic attempt to drag himself off somewhere quieter, and he’s looking away too but his snarling hate dies to something simply sour. With a little less wariness, a bit less jerkingly hesitant movements he holds his cup out, if only because he frankly doesn’t trust himself with the entire bottle after blacking out and barely realizing it already. “Alright. But don’t just.. /fix/ it.”

Anders draws a deep breath and lets it out again. “Do you want this scar that badly?” He pours Fenris another cup, fairly secure in the fact that the arrow hit his guts and not his liver. “Tell me what you’ll allow and I’ll do it. And if you’d take some bread and milk, I’d be grateful.”

“/No magic/.” Seems a simple enough rule, though he suspects the healer might have a hard time of it at some point. But for now he seems a bit more pacified, more focused on finishing his second cup in quick, hard swallows. The burn shoots down his throat and settles in his stomach, and he can feel it radiate heat to the wound, but then he stops and looks up. “You think this is about bragging rights?”

“No. I think I could spare you a fresh scar and a lot of suffering if you would let me heal you, and I wish you would. I wish you would reconsider.” Anders breaks the loaf of bread into the wooden bowl he brought it in, then pours milk over the torn pieces of the loaf.

Fenris sets the cup down, empty but he still places it carefully and level, and holds out his hand because he imagines there’s some good to it, if Anders seems so insistent on him eating though his stomach is trying to convince him the world is ending inside him and the thought of eating turns it. “If you’re asking that, then you don’t understand at all.”

“Then make me understand. This is one of the only good things I can do with what I am.” Anders hands over the bread and milk.

The food is intimidating in its own way and Fenris stares down at it as he stirs the halved loaf in the bowl, tries to sum up his thoughts while he steels his already tight stomach, and takes a weak bite. “If I become accustomed to an easy way out, I’ll start rely on it. Take risks. It would kill me. You don’t learn with shortcuts.”

Anders looks bewildered with that, but he nods. It isn’t at all the answer he expected, but it’s one he can respect, one Fenris has every right to make. "Alright. I won’t use any more magic than I already have. Once you’ve got some food down I need you to strip down. I have to clean and suture that wound for you, and you’re not going to like it.“

The elf’s eyebrows raise as he goes silent, softly surprised that a mage would understand the point he’s trying to make without looking at him like he’s gone mad, and when he composes himself again at least enough to continue eating, it’s with a small smirk at the corner of his lips. “That’s.. fine.” But that’s not sufficient, and he turns his head up, slightly to one side, to look at Anders more pointedly. “I should thank you for this.”

"Do you, then?” Anders tone is dry and a bit arch, but he punctuates the words with a tender look as he rises from the bed. "I need to get some water boiling, love. Eat as much as you can stand and please be here when I get back. And if you won’t let me heal you with magic, I want you to understand there is going to be a lot of nourishing soup in your future.“

Fenris looks down just as quickly, a sharp turn of his eyes but not his chin, and he sinks back against the pillow, feeling as heavy as he is pained. For all that he just championed not taking shortcuts, he’s grateful for what’s been forced upon him thusfar, and that his wound is currently only a strong stabbing ache. “I couldn’t go anywhere if I wanted to.”

Anders is already slipping out the door when Fenris answers, leaving the room silent except for the crackling of the fire in the hearth. When he returns, he has a large pot of steaming water carried in both hands, and a leather satchel and a roll of bandages tucked under his arm. He sets the water down beside the bed, then the satchel, doing his best to focus on his work as he arranges his tools.

At some point very shortly after Anders returns, a very specific point, a switch flips in his stomach between one bite and the next, that it put up with him ignoring this nausea but heaven help him if he swallows one more bite, and with a wince he passes the bowl to the side table. He can still smell it, the mix of milk and bread quickly fouling his nose but he huffs, winces his eyes shut as the motion makes an unexpected kick to his stomach, and weakly mumbles as he focuses instead at fingering loose the tie on the current wrapping around his stomach. “Here I thought this would be happening to you first…”

“Being wounded and depending on you to nurse me back to health?” Anders can’t help but sound amused at the thought. When he notices the look on Fenris’s face, he moves the food away from the bed, setting it on the hearth for the time being. "I don’t know, it /could/ just as easily have been me. I’d rather have had it be me. You’re fairly capable at rescuing, and such.“ Anders dips his hands in the steaming water, and towels them off with a clean cloth. Arranged in his open satchel are some curved needles and suturing thread.

“Only to drag you home in one piece. Not much work on my part.” Fenris quickly realizes he’s going to have to sit up to get his clothes and makeshift bandages off so instead unlatches his gauntlets, flexes his hand open to slip out of the jointed fingers when they’re at their loosest, hisses in pain when even lifting his bad arm sends a small spike through him. He quickly comes to realize the dull ache is only when he’s not moving, and it makes the pain when he moves all the more jarring. But he manages, face scrunched but gauntlets dropped to the stone, the sound loud but better than getting more blood and dirt than he’s about to on the bed. 

Anders does what he can to help, which at this stage isn’t as much as he’d like. He helps loosen buckles and fastenings, helps tug Fenris’s clothes off, being as cautious and gentle as he can. "You wouldn’t hear me complaining,” he answers.

For any comments Fenris has made that they wear too much clothing, those times feel like a breeze now. Pulling off his chest plate straps, then the rough patch job, and finally his torn and bloodied top turns into a process, punctuated only by the small breaks of having to set it all aside. More than once he feels a wave of nausea simply from sitting up, a dizzying moment or two of darkly clouded vision threatening to make Anders’ job far harder with an unconscious elf, and little wonder- once his clothes are peeled away the wound is no longer a simple bloody spot under a small hole of torn fabric, but a gaping, vibrantly red tear. 

Anders frowns while he studies the dimensions of that gash in Fenris’s side. It’s a clean wound, at least, with nothing of the injured flesh around the wound suggesting a poisoned arrow or an already-incubating infection. “The sooner I start, the sooner this will be done and you can rest.” Anders says it with a heavy sigh, aware of what an ordeal they’re going to be facing. "Tell me when you’re ready.“ He begins to thread one of his long, curved needles.

Fenris’ breathing grows pointedly steady, though still ragged on the edges, and he nods. It’s a purposeful thing, determined, because if he doesn’t do it now he never will and that won’t solve anything. His head ducks towards his chest, staring at nothing and steeling himself. “Get on with it.”

Anders places a warm, steady hand beside the wound in Fenris’s side. He’s aware of it on a level deeper than sight or touch, the pain Fenris feels like a buzz in his ears or a nagging itch, a sharp taste on the back of his tongue. He wants to mend that torn flesh. It’s as hard to stop his magic from reaching out and doing so as it is to keep from using his hands to catch himself during a fall or from letting his mind read words his eyes have fallen upon. His expression turns drawn and severe as he presses the needle down into Fenris’s flesh and makes the first stitch.

The curve along Fenris’ jaw tightens, softly more prominent as he sets his teeth with a sour look, eyes scrunching shut immediately, and even through it he makes a small uneasy shift of his weight away from the mage’s palm. The pain is a beesting, tolerable on its own but the pull and drag through, the knot catching at the entry and closing the skin awakens the nest of hornets, and in a radiating wave his insides are stinging as if boiling oil was poured onto him, starting at the wound and lancing in all over again. 

Anders can’t spare any time for sympathy. He knows that if he hesitates, it only prolongs the pain Fenris has to endure. So he works quickly, as quickly as he can without rushing, and Anders has deft, sure fingers for this kind of work. The needle plunges and rises, again and again, and the stiff thread pulls the wound closed bit by bit.

Fenris chokes back all but the loudest agony, jaw forced open as his lungs are squeezed of air, like his insides are trying their hardest to pull away. His midsection is no better, abs flexing taught against his will, but it doesn’t break Anders’ work and some tiny part of him, that secluded part at the back of his skull where the pain can’t reach, is grateful for the quick work of it. The pain isn’t really much less as Anders nears finishing, the hive of stinging just sealed in, and the elf can only concentrate on keeping his breath steady and shallow. “Have you done this before?”

"A number of times,” Anders answers, his voice low and rough. At last, he pulls the final stitch taut and ties it off, exhaling with a tremor in his breath. He dabs at the sutured wound with alcohol to clean it a final time, but he quickly rinses it with water, soothing away the burn. What remains is to bandage Fenris again, and he does it briskly but gently, pressing a pad in place over the wound and then binding it down snugly as he wraps Fenris’s torso. "I’m not always at liberty to use magic when someone needs my help.“

The alcohol elicits a tiny squeak from Fenris’ throat, at once bringing everything into razorlike focus, his eyes noticeably glossy but hidden from how tightly narrowed they are. Even once washed clean and covered his side shivers, in turn sending small convulsions of his muscles as the small movements flicker at the damaged nerves. A small smirk crosses his face for an instant, too strained to linger and altogether humorless. “Someone other than me?”

"Templars, chantry sisters, or anybody with the poor judgment to get injured in a public place.” Anders fastens the bandages in place and lets some of the tension ebb from the set of his jaw. "Alright, it’s done. Now you don’t need to do anything but rest and let me fuss over you.“

The twisted, harsh snarl on Fenris’ face finally begins to lessen as he carefully drops back against the bed, replaced by thorough exhaustion so much that he closes his eyes for a moment. Anders fussing over him is such an easier task when compared to his previous options of being tied down or simply enduring with whatever he could manage himself. “And everyone else, to be sure I haven’t died.” There’s a hint of annoyance in that, like he half suspects they’re already lined up at the door.

"I won’t let them stay long enough to wear on you,” Anders says. He straightens up the remaining mess as quickly as he can, putting his tools away, moving things to where they can sit undisturbed. “And I’ll make sure they bring tribute before you in the form of wine, and settling Diamondback debts.”

Fenris nearly chuckles, but the sound is cut short in his throat as the first mutter of it catches at his shredded insides. But his weak smile remains, however pained. “/Please/, no humor. You might kill me.” It takes a moment but he does his best to force his stomach to relax again, and raises his good hand out. “Come here, so I can thank you properly.”

Anders rushes to meet that touch. Now that there aren’t a hundred pressing concerns between them, he needs it, and he drops to his knees at the side of the bed to rest his cheek against Fenris’s palm. "Rest and recover. To have you here… there’s no greater reward.“

Fenris closes his fingers, lightly pressing the pads to Anders, thumb drawing along jawline with those ever so faint prickles of stubble coming back in. Small distraction, something tactile for him to focus on in the haze of his body’s misery. "There’s always something about you I can never put my finger on. You’re unlike anyone I’ve ever met, mage.”

Anders shuts his eyes, and for a moment his whole world is Fenris’s touch and the sound of his voice. He lets out a soft chuckle at those words and opens his eyes again, brown eyes glimmering with amber honey in the warm light of the room. "I should say the same about you.“ Reluctant, tired, and stiff, he rises back to his feet to strip out of his tunic and kick off his boots. His trousers follow quickly and he slips into bed beside Fenris, pulling the covers and the large, heavy fur up over them both and drawing in snug against the elf’s unwounded side.

Fenris drops his head and lets his cheek sink to the pillow. While his hand settles, crosses his stomach to press his palm to the wound, or the entry of it at least, a smirk crosses his eyes more than the forced quirk at the corner of his mouth. “I can’t imagine you’ve met many slaves in the first place.”

"Not unless you count Tranquil,” Anders answers. He leans his forehead against the nape of Fenris’s neck and shuts his eyes once more. "And you, I can’t imagine you knew many apostates before you ended up in Kirkwall.“

“Apostates? I was going to settle for mages. Or did you want to try abominations?”

"And I was going to settle for ‘men’.” Anders puckers his lips into a light kiss against the base of Fenris’s hair. "And anyhow, you flatter me. Whatever I am, I’m yours.“

Any further words cut short, not an abrupt silence but a softened one, calmed despite the wounded agitation gnawing at Fenris’ insides, both literally and figuratively. “Mm. Are you ever going to get used to it?”

"Wouldn’t it start to feel less wonderful if I were used to it?” Anders sounds as if he’s examining that idea for perhaps the first time. He exhales a gentle puff of warm breath against the back of Fenris’s ear.

The elf tips his head at it, an instinctual flick to get his ear out of the way of the tickling heat, and he sighs through his nose when all the movement does is shift hair aside and expose inner and more delicate curves further. “It is… comfortable, in its own right. That someone takes you for granted.”

“I could get used to you,” Anders confesses. "I’m getting there. When I try to think of how my life was before we were together, it seems… further away, and almost unimaginably harsh. I never thought of all that hardship as some chapter in my life that I’d close someday. And I never expected I’d be laying down beside a lover every night… not just someone I’ve taken to bed, but someone who knows me, someone I trust. I wanted this, and now that I finally know what it’s like? It’s even better than I thought it would be.“

It’s an answer that draws Fenris’ silence again, truly putting thought to something, and when he finds some sort of answer he turns his head to find the mage’s eyes, even if mostly just from the corner of his own. Something somber has washed his expression, in turn barely hiding something vulnerable. “Even free, I never think that far ahead.” He can look back to the time before he’d settled in Kirkwall, on the run from slavers and Tevinter soldiers, and never once did he really put thought to what his ultimate goal was, or what he’d want to do if he was ever rid of them.

"That isn’t good.” Anders speaks softly, his arm draping across Fenris’s chest to hold him. "I always had to have a plan,“ he continues. "Even if I knew it wasn’t likely to come about, even if I knew my odds were bad, I still had one. Something to run towards, as well as everything to run away from. The only time I didn’t was when I was in solitary. I felt like I was sliding into a black pit, a little more each day…” Anders shakes his head, forehead against Fenris’s shoulder. "You will have a future,“ he says. "I’d stake my life on that. And that is what I would love to see you take for granted.”

Fenris shakes his head, as much as he can manage between being bedridden and exhausted, his eyelids closing partway as he looks down to the space between them, thin but present. “It wasn’t that I thought I didn’t have one. I just.. never thought about it. I was running because I had to.” He pauses to draw his eyes up again, but only makes it to a small few strands of blonde hair. “I still think like a slave.”

Anders watches Fenris’s face and the emotions that chase eachother across his features. With his eyes downcast, he looks so vulnerable it makes his heart ache. "Sometimes, love, when you say these things… it’s as if you castigate yourself for it. As if… you want it to change and you’re angry with yourself that it hasn’t changed already, on its own. You don’t deserve that. You don’t deserve to be punished or ashamed.“

“I shouldn’t be?” There’s anger turning to his voice, a weakened but still intense snarl, though purely directed inward. “It’s been years. Danarius is dead. I’m trying to change only to find that I haven’t at all.”

"Is being angry at yourself going to help?” Anders’s arm tightens around Fenris on impulse, but he forces it to ease a moment later, wary of causing Fenris any pain. "Because it isn’t your fault, and beating yourself up for who you are makes about as much sense as Danarius brandishing a whip at you or any slave and commanding 'Be free! Do as I say and be free!’“

Fenris puffs a small exhale of air, the best Anders is going to get for a laugh right now. “I can’t imagine it, even in jest.”

"Of course not, because it’s nonsense.” Anders smiles at Fenris, playful and tender. "I love you. I know you say I must be mad to love you, but I hope you don’t believe that. You’re worthy of it. You’ve earned it, and you’ve paid me back a hundredfold, and I’m never going to stop.“

“I’m beginning to realize I might be stuck with you for quite some time, yes.”

Anders grins at that. "It doesn’t sound like you’re complaining, thankfully.”

“No, I don’t think I am. I’m sure I’ll regret that, at some point.”


	42. Chapter 42

Orana makes a quiet entrance late in the morning – quiet by elvhen standards, and silent by human, so it’s understandable that Anders doesn’t see her standing in the doorway of the kitchen while he scrubs linens and bandages in a washtub full of steaming hot water. She has her hands on her hips and her lips pursed, at first waiting to be noticed out of the corner of the mage’s eye, but with his hair down it was as if he had blinders on. Why did she slip in as silently as a footpad, anyway? She knew Anders wasn’t about to beat her for insubordination. He probably wouldn’t even yell at her… probably. It annoys her all over again to feel herself inwardly cringe at the thought. She was free. She didn’t have to be afraid, and nobody had any right to mistreat her, and she was going to be brave. Yet it takes her two tries to successfully clear her throat, and Anders nearly jumps out of his tunic at the unexpected “ahem.”  
“Orana! Thank goodness you’re here, Fenris–”  
“I know what happened, Merrill told me all about it.”  
“Good, I could really use a h–”  
“No.”  
Anders blinks dumbly, finally noticing the flinty look in Orana’s eyes.  
“I came to say goodbye. You and Fenris have been gracious to let me stay here for so long, but I no longer wish to live in this house.”

 

If there is anything Fenris is exceptional at, it is being a stubborn ass when it comes down to it. Most notably when Anders tells him to stay put in bed, because once the nausea wears off some time in the early morning nothing save stabbing him again is going to make him stay in that bed and try to sleep all day or otherwise be so coddled.  
So even if he has to take a few breaks, leaning his good side to a wall or banister, he makes his way down the stairs. Perhaps to mention that he’s finally noticed Orana’s absence in the mansion while pestering Anders for his own shameless entertainment.  
That, and the pain is beginning to set in too harshly again while the glass is all empty upstairs.  
It’s when he notices Orana in the doorway that he stops, and only catches the end of the conversation at hand. “What have you done now, mage?”

“I– I don’t even–” Anders stammers helplessly while Orana turns stiffly on her heels. Color rises in her cheeks and she bites her bottom lip as if trying to contain the words that eventually spill out.  
“/You/ should talk! You’re worse than he is!” Orana stamps her foot and jumps a bit in surprise at the noise it makes. She’s far more used to being the object of ire than the originator. She draws in a breath and steels herself to continue, looking Fenris in the eye. "Merrill is my best and dearest friend. After what you both said to her yesterday… I can’t… I feel so furious that I thought…“ She trails off and captures her fuming behind clenched teeth.  
"I misjudged you. You’re both /terrible/, cruel, smallminded people. I thought you were kind but you aren’t, and I’d -have- to be a slave to even lift a finger for either one of you. How /dare/ you speak to her like that when she lost her Keeper in that way… how dare you, when she was crying!”

Fenris hardly looks hurt by her words, nor does he shift uncomfortably, but the lack of obvious compassion is rather on par with how he’s always been when accused of something. Or it could be simply that he looks ragged as it is, stance hardly what it usually is, hardly ready. “If I was cruel I would have left her to her clan. Do you think they deserved to die for her mistake?”

“So you think I’m angry with you for no reason?” Orana can’t hide that she’s hurt by that, her eyes narrowing, her chin lifting defiantly. "Her people didn’t deserve to die but they were going to kill you. That was their decision, she didn’t make it for them, and she didn’t choose for Keeper Marethari to sacrifice herself that way. The one decision she did make was that restoring the Eluvian was her responsibility and she was willing to die for her people. Instead, she lost the closest thing she had to a family and you both stood there and told her it was the least she deserved! Whatever you think of her choices, that was /cruel/ and.. and… I don’t want to see either of you again.“ Orana is shaking by the end of her speech, and she quickly rubs away the tears that brim in her eyes. Behind her, Anders is white as a sheet as he half sits, half falls onto a kitchen bench.  
"Orana, I’m sorry! I tried all this time to warn her and she wouldn’t listen…”  
“She listened. She knew what she was doing was dangerous and she knew she might die, but it’s -her- life! She told me that this is what her people needed from her and this was how she could make sure her life and her death had meaning. But you just went on assuming she didn’t know what she was doing! She’s not -you-, Anders, she wasn’t dealing with a demon thinking everything would be just fine.”

“It’s not what her people wanted.” Fenris catches his side as a particularly sharp spike complains, pointedly, that he’s becoming too sober. His good arm steadies himself to the nearest wall, quick and stiff, the only visible strength when the rest of him slumps, ready to crumble, and with a small glare to nothing in particular he steels himself and sucks in a breath, pushes away from the wall to carefully pass Orana for the nearest bottle of wine in the kitchen. At least it’s one of the few things he can count on being readily available. “Blood magic does nothing but destroy and taint everything around it. You should know this.”

“If that’s true how can you explain Merrill’s warmth and kindness? If what you say is true she’s the one who should be cold and cruel, not you. She took me into her life with open arms and you? You can’t even say ‘I love you’ to the person you’ve been sleeping with for months. The world isn’t as simple as you’d like it to be. That’s no excuse for how you’ve been. You owe her an apology… and me.” The look in Orana’s eyes has lost its steely sharpness, and her anger has ebbed away into something sad, but she doesn’t crumble.  
“Orana… I… I don’t know what to say…” Anders hangs his head, trying to sort through his feelings. Maybe it’s true he misjudged and misread Merrill all this time. "I wish you wouldn’t go, I wish… I wish you’d said this sooner and maybe…“ He stammers, lifting his head again with a pleading look in his eyes. "I am so sorry, I’m sorry on both our behalf, and I’ll go tell Merrill myself as soo–”  
“No. You can’t be sorry /for/ him, you can’t always be the one to take his lumps for him…” She indicates Fenris with a tilt of her head. "…and I can’t live under the same roof as him, not now. I’m going to gather up my things.“

Fenris falters his hips back against the counter as he drinks, and doesn’t stop until he feels the familiar and welcomed burn to the back of his throat, the wine on his breath and not just down his throat. When he looks back up his eyes have sharpened for the amount hers have softened, from a neutral tone to the viciousness of a wounded animal he half resembles. "Life has been kinder to you. I’m not going to discuss this when you’ve made up your mind about me regardless. There’s no point in apologizing if you could care less for my reasons.”

“Life has been /kinder to me/?” Orana outright scoffs. She opens her mouth to retort, but then shuts it again, an uncharacteristic curl of disgust on her lip. "I’m not wasting another breath on you.“ Without a second glance at either Fenris or Anders, she turns and sweeps out of the room.  
Anders sits still, for a moment gaping at Fenris that he would say such a thing. Fenris says such things to him all the time, of course, but this was /Orana/. He wraps one arm around his midsection. The room feels colder now, and Anders can’t fathom why he suddenly feels sick to his stomach.

Fenris watches the empty space she’d taken, the venomous glare to his narrow eyes fading, slowly, to a simple sour scowl, not remorseful for a word of it. When he turns his gaze to Anders his defenses are rising again, ready and expecting Anders to yell at him, lay into sensitive places Orana already stabbed at. But it doesn’t come. And in its place, the mage just looks as haggard as he feels. "What?”

Anders opens his mouth to speak, but a hiccuping sob wells up in place of his voice. He shuts his mouth, hoping that will be enough to quash what he’s feeling, but he sobs again, his shoulders and chest jerking with the force of it. There’s incredulity in his eyes, as if he doesn’t even know why he’s so upset.

The defense and anger falls from Fenris’ face to exasperated confusion, and he sighs heavily as sinks back to focusing on the wine. There’s simply no more energy within him anymore, Orana took it all, the stern facade along with his resolve. “Just leave her be.”

“She’s /leaving/! She can’t even stand to look at us, and… and I think she may be right! You’re fine with this? You’re so sure you’ve done no wrong?”

There it is, what he was expecting. Meager as it is. Fenris’ retaliation is there, but calmer, hoping Anders will be more apt to just listen. “In what way is she right? How does it matter a person’s intentions? Merrill has seen how many victims blood magic has claimed, and turned a blind eye to it anyway with the intention of sacrificing herself for something her clan didn’t want. And now they’ve paid for her choices she forced upon them.”

“And yet… ” Anders shakes his head. "She saw the consequences of it all. She was there. What I said… it didn’t need to be said. Orana has a right to be angry.“ Anders rests his elbows on his knees and slumps forward, tangled hair falling over his face.

"It needed to be said, unless you think Merrill will stop using blood magic even after all these needless deaths. But if she finds issue with your words, that is her cause. Orana hasn’t seen what we have.”

“She saw her father butchered by Hadriana. How do you just dismiss that?”

“So your answer is to dismiss me instead.”

“I’m not dismissing you. I’m disagreeing with you.” Anders raises his head slightly. "I’m also disagreeing with you being out of bed. If you don’t get back in bed with all due haste, I -will- heal you with magic.“

Fenris just returns that with a parting glare, leaving the moment of silence clear that lines of respect would be crossed with that threat. But he sinks a little farther, kickstanding the heel of his palm to the counter behind him. “It’s the same if you think I’m cold as much as she says, and for no cause.”

Anders stands up, taking slow steps toward Fenris. "I don’t think you’re cold.” He puts an arm around Fenris’s back and stoops to sweep him up into his arms. "I do think you’re going back to bed now. The rest of this? I despair of ever sorting it out. Even Justice refuses to comment.“

The elf flinches and lets out a growling hiss at his healing insides getting shuffled, the tattered nerves momentarily blowing past the numb warmth of alcohol and sending another arrow through him. Even still he manages to croak out, “I’m not apologizing.”

"Fine, don’t. Let it cost you a friendship. I’m going to talk to her when I can, she deserves that much at least.” Anders keeps Fenris cradled against his chest and carries him slowly up the steps.

For the first few steps Fenris makes lame attempts to wriggle free, but he gives up readily when his wound complains on top of Anders’ insistence. “You heard what she thinks of me. I doubt her opinion will change whether I go or not.”

“You’re making excuses. ” Anders says it levelly, his arms tight and secure around Fenris. They’re in the bedroom soon enough, and Anders lays Fenris back on the bed he’d abandoned minutes ago. "And if you don’t care enough to make the attempt then that only proves her point. “

Fenris winces again as he’s set to the bed, though less so. “I fail to see why I need to prove anything to someone who has been around me for so long and still comes to those conclusions.” He may still, but not now, not when her words gnaw at him.

Anders climbs onto the bed as well, poised over Fenris on all fours and looking down at him with a quizzical expression. “You’re both pissed at eachother, you both said atrocious things, and if you want to make it better you’re both going to have to give some ground. Forgive me if that’s obvious but it sounds like you aren’t seeing it right now. She came here to stand up for her best friend and I don’t think she’s ever so much as raised her voice in her life until now.”

Fenris goes quiet for his part, willing to concede that much perhaps, a less daunting thing with nobody else to cast some judgemental misunderstanding. But the topic is dropped, distracting heat of the wine drawing his attention more towards the mage’s proximity and the fact that he can do nothing about it. Nothing that wouldn’t hurt, that he’d horribly regret later. The best he manages is a faltering negotiation, raises his head just enough to kiss the stubbly end of Anders’ chin. “You certainly inspire that in slaves.”

Anders actually chuckles at that. He lowers his face and kisses the corner of Fenris’s mouth, his head raising just a bit before he dips down to kiss Fenris again, just below his lower lip. And again, and again, and again, as if intent on covering his face with kisses one by one.

The touches are as much a welcome overwhelming as heavy drops of a concluding thunderstorm, and Fenris’ lips part with his remaining weight on the issue, stress leaving with the exhale, eyes closing lightly. “Surely you realize how maddening this is.” Yet he sounds as relaxed as he could be, pained and somewhat intoxicated but at ease.

“Yes, I do. I was realizing it in excruciating detail before you woke up, in fact.” Anders pauses to speak, but doesn’t stop, continuing to bestow warm, tender kisses on Fenris’s face, wandering now and again to his neck and his ears. "I love you, Fenris. Even my poor, aching balls love you.“

Fenris can’t stop himself from coughing a harsh chuckle at that, flinches with a wince as his side punishes him for it as if the arrow is still dug into him. “/mentula/… damn mage. You’ll never see me better at this rate.”

"I’m sorry, I’ll shut up.” Anders nuzzles in against Fenris’s throat, and his kisses become more lingering. The smallest fraction of his weight rests on Fenris’s chest. He utters a wordless, murmuring sigh of satisfaction at being able to bury his face in the warmth of Fenris’s skin.

 

His skin, the faintest layer of peachfuzz on his chest where somewhat coarser hair covers Anders’, the slow swell of his breathing, ribcage rising higher to keep air from expanding his diaphragm. So unnatural, but he learned fast. “You have your hand, at any rate. I am without even that much.”

“Mmm. What if I told you I’m denying myself, out of solidarity.” Anders shifts against Fenris, settling at last against his uninjured side and draping both an arm and a leg across him. His fingertips drag along Fenris’s chest and collarbone, caressing him idly.

“Then I’d inform you that you might possibly be mad.” Fenris chuckles again but this time almost silently, more tightly controlled. “Or that you won’t last three days.”

“I’ll /try/, I really will.” Anders kisses Fenris on the shoulder. "And when you’re better we’ll have the most incredible sex. We’ll be scraping come off the ceiling.“

Fenris glances up as if trying to imagine it, but just winces his eyes shut and groans, this time less from immediate pain. “That’s going to be too far away, don’t remind me /now/.”

"It will be that much sooner if you stay in bed and mend,” Anders teases.

Fenris shoots him a noncommittal glare. “Entirely what I intended to do.” Surely, after this morning. Though his recollection of it draws his gaze, drifting, back towards the ceiling. “Why were you crying?”

“It felt like getting scolded by my mother. I didn’t know if I was happy or sad, but it just… it tore right through me.” Anders smiles, but it’s a wistful look. "I had to remind myself that I’m a grown man and the world isn’t ending and I can talk this out with her.“

Fenris levels his eyes on the mage, studying the expression with his words with a critical intensity, because he looks altogether puzzled by every inch of that response. There’s no sense to an ounce of it. The elf sighs, visibly giving up and sinking back to the pillow, stares back to the terribly aging mansion above them. “You’re strange.”

"You noticed,” Anders responds dryly. "Now, so you don’t become horribly bored, I’m going to bring some books for you to read, and a deck of cards so you can whip my rear at Go Fish. And if there’s anything else you want, I am at your beck and call, messere.“

“Wait-” But Fenris isn’t quite sure what he wanted to ask, that he just felt incredibly alien to the notions Anders spoke of, and the word stales in the air between them. “…nevermind. Go on.”

Anders looks at Fenris, puzzled. "No, what is it? I’m not in a hurry to climb out of bed.”

“Why would you be happy to anyone /scolding/ you? I feel truly no closer to what tore at you so.”

“Because …. it made me feel for a moment like I had a mother again.”

“Mm.” And that seems fair enough, regardless of family. But now that Anders says it, the reason seems obvious. Maybe Fenris was looking to far into it. “I’m sorry, that wasn’t strange at all. It’s understandable.”

Anders leans over Fenris at that to kiss him full on the mouth, this time with more than a hint of passion and force behind it. "Thank you,“ he says.

And Fenris responds to it, as much as he can, an arch of his neck, the desperation to his lips all too anxious that the meeting will drift apart too soon, and when the force does cool between them he slips, lets his chin drop until his forehead rests on Anders’ lips. “Don’t thank me for something I fumble to understand.”

Anders shakes his head, a chuckle in his throat. "You try. You’re one of the only ones who ever cared enough to try. So thank you for that.” His lips move against Fenris’s brow as he speaks, his voice quiet and gentle.

“Even if I don’t agree with you, Anders, I want to know you.” Fenris rocks his head forward, nuzzles lightly to the touch, a halting movement the elf seems wholly unfamiliar with as much as it’s uncharacteristic of him.

Anders answers to the contact, turning and tilting his head, letting his cheek and jaw rub against the side of Fenris’s face. Eyes closed, he breathes in deeply, marvelling at how it still feels like a caress when Fenris speaks his name. "I want the same, you know. I want to know you.“

“Then I’d suggest a game… but I can’t let you move.” Not far enough to sit up and drink anyway, and certainly not far enough to get the alcohol they left in the kitchen. At least he managed to down enough that his body aches in a dulled and warm haze.  
A more direct approach was more like Fenris’’ tastes, anyway. “How did Karl ever react when they brought you back to the circle? How did they catch you?”

"Karl would get very tight-lipped when the Templars brought me back in. Looking back, I think he was anxious. Probably thinking the same things I was, wondering if this time they were going to have my head on the block. And he would sit with me, while we waited for them to decide, at least as much as they’d let him. We’d talk about trivial things, gossip, anything but us, or what was going to happen next.” Anders lets out a heavy sigh, Karl’s face and his voice coming so clearly to mind when he thinks about it. "Sometimes I wondered why he didn’t avoid me. He didn’t want to see me put to the sword, he shouldn’t have had to see that, but he still came. Just so I wouldn’t be alone.“  
"As for how they found me, they had my phylactery. After the first couple of times this woman, Rylock, was always the one out to collect me. She hated me with a passion. The last time she went after me, the Warden Commander actually stood in her path and cut her down. He told me he wouldn’t let the Templars touch me and he said it like there wasn’t a doubt in his mind that if he forbade it, they’d never be able to. And for a while, he made it true.”

Fenris nods, faint only because Anders can’t see it, but he makes up for the fact by kissing the neck in front of his lips. “But do you think you would have gotten away, if it weren’t for the phylactery? Do you think it would have made any difference at all, in the end, save perhaps prolong the inevitable?” That, or the Templars in Ferelden had become inept at tracking mages down any other way.

“Maybe if I’d left Ferelden. Maybe if I’d resolved never to touch magic again. But …even though I thought about it, I couldn’t bring myself to do either. And even with every precaution in the world, all it takes is one slip, one person to turn you in.” Anders’s voice is a calm, warm thrum in his throat, and his chin rests on Fenris’s scalp whenever he falls silent. "Was it the same while you were on the run? You always seemed certain it would only be a matter of time…“

“It was. I was never free for long. Either someone noticed my scars if I lingered, or the amount of swords I’d hire. Even if I escaped, there’s only so far I could go in any direction, and it was simply a matter of time again. Hawke was the only reason they began to hesitate.”

Fenris’s reply brings Anders’ thoughts back to the day they first met and the beginning of what at first seemed unlikely to even become friendship. "I found you so… compelling… that day we met you on the Alienage steps. You had so much poise and confidence it seemed strange to me that you would need anybody’s help. But I’m glad you no longer think I’m a viper.”

Fenris sniffs at that, the faint amusement without having to move much about it. “You were less a viper, more emphatically annoying. I assumed you would betray me to Danarius at your first chance to.”

“Ah. Unfortunately I think I’m still annoying,” Anders is smiling as he says it, though. "And you, of course, are still gorgeous. That wasn’t the only impression I had of you at first sight but it’s certainly one of them.“

Fenris half-lids his eyes, visibly fends off an eyeroll. No, he’s never going to really believe it, no matter how often Anders tells him. “I hope the other impressions were less delusioned.”

"I also thought… let me see.” Anders voice softens. "That you were a bit of a git but strangely enough you were trying not to be, like this entire notion that you could hurt people was new to you. That you were vulnerable, and again, trying not to be. And that you hated me, and you were perfectly comfortable with that.“

“Years running from mages, and you call me a ‘bit of a git’. Do you honestly blame me? Be glad I didn’t try to kill you the moment I knew.”

"No, I don’t blame you. Didn’t say that I did. And this was all what I thought six, seven years ago.”

“Mm.” That answer is enough to satisfy him, or at least relax the muscles under Anders’ hold. Until an idle curiosity strikes him, and Fenris shifts his chin so he can look up. “What did I do to give you that notion, unless it was simply my distrust?”

“Your manner with people could be… sharp sometimes, brusque. You said more than a few things to me that were…” Anders sighs heavily. "I don’t want you to think that by answering this, that I’m not past all this now, with you. We laid it to rest some time ago. But I remember this night, you had been on a bit of a rant about mages being too weak for their power. I swore I’d prove to you that I’m not weak, and you sneered at me. I suppose that your barbs drew any comment from me at all only proved your point. You were always softer with Bethany. You respected her. I wanted the same. From the very start you were gracious with the others, and they respected you. Sometimes our arguments left me feeling like an outcast.“

The cat chooses that moment to hop up, and while at first Fenris shifts his gaze away from the mage to watch the beast warily, expecting it to hop onto his stomach and kill him faster, the tabby curls up by his wounded side, leaning warmth into him, and he sighs in easy defeat. His head falls back to the pillow, Anders’ words landing back into his mind as he looks up, as if he hadn’t heard the meaning until now. “You were jealous of Bethany? She was… she didn’t react much against any hostility.”

"She grew up with a family that loved her. It was everything I ever wanted. It wasn’t rancorous jealousy, but I did envy that. She always has this stability and poise to her, as well. So much calm, even in moments where I feel like I have to clench every muscle to keep from flying appart. Sometimes being around you both was like having someone shining a light on all my faults. I wished I could disappear.”

“I imagine she lead a relatively normal life, as much as her father could provide her. You don’t think that gave her an unfair advantage to any of these faults you mention?” For a moment he closes his eyes, breathes carefully as the cat thrums a loud purr against him, and mutters. “And see who kept me…”

“I’m not so broken I can’t feel love,” Anders says it with a hint of a chuckle. "If anything I’ve been starving for it. I think… with you, sometimes, I get to be a better man,“ He shuts his eyes, listening to the rumble of his cat’s pur from the other side of the bed. 

Fenris cracks an eye open as Anders closes his, watches him for a few moments out of the corner of his vision. “Do you still feel I do that, shine a light on your faults?” It’s strange to even say, he feels so broken himself, not just literally with this bloody hole carved out of his side.

"No,” Anders answers, quiet and without hesitation. "You make me feel like I have a reason not to give up on myself.“

“When I mentioned that I didn’t have plans for the future, when I was running, and you said that was bad,” Fenris lets his eyes trail back upward in thought, back to too many nights when he decided to slink around a dim fire rather than huddle in rags with other elves, “I didn’t think about it because I didn’t have to. If I had to run the rest of my life, then that was what I was going to do. I won’t say there weren’t moments I became tired of it.”

"It’s bad for other reasons… but it sounds like it was different for you. For me it felt like yet another wall closing in on me. I had no hope.” Anders’s voice dwindles to a small, lonely sound. He ducks his chin, wanting to feel Fenris’s hair on his face. "I had no future, and I couldn’t endure the present. I wanted to… I tried to die.“

Fenris stops, a small simple blink as he turns his head almost instinctively, only further burying Anders’ face between him and the pillow, the mage’s breath hot and tickling along his ear. “When?”

"I was in solitary. It was my eight or ninth month in that cell. I managed to chip a piece of stone off the wall and sharpen it to an edge. Then I…” Anders swallows hard. "I waited until after the evening meal, when the guards wouldn’t be back for a while, and I cut into my wrists as deep as I could. Unfortunately the stone wasn’t all that sharp and the blood made it hard to get a good grip…they found me when they checked the cells at curfew.“

 

Fenris pauses then turns, his whole body resisting but still quickly enough that he sucks in a sharp gasp, a choked groan as his hips follow and even with his shoulders, but he forces himself to with a grim determination in his eyes, that complaining about it would earn Anders a similar wound to deal with. And with his better arm under him Fenris reaches out, beneath the mage’s mess of hair about his neck, and hooks his arm to press his hand to the back of the blond hair, draws them tight until their lips meet, the elf’s forceful with all his remaining energy, suddenly desperate that Anders may yet be a ghost. The small shifting between them to get comfortable breaks their lips, only long enough for Fenris to make another uncomfortable hiss inward, and to choke out, “Don’t ever do it again. I couldn’t bear to lose you.”

Anders opens his mouth for that kiss and drinks it in, clinging to Fenris harder than he means to. His eyes open, dark and solemn. "I will stay with you as long as I can.” It’s a weaker promise than he would like to make, but it’s all he’s sure he can keep. "And if I leave, I will be wishing every moment that it wasn’t so, wishing to rush back to you.“

“I won’t let you have that chance.” Fenris sinks their lips closer again, hot with their emotions and tasting faintly of his drinking. The desperation fades to something more somber, the elf’s mouth drifting apart as he props his forehead to Anders’, eyes cast downward with a frown tugging at the edges of his expression.

"Keep me,” Anders rasps between their kisses. "Even if I curse you for it in the end I’ll thank you. I /want/ this.“ Anders presses his lips to Fenris’s, desperately wanting him to raise his eyes again.

The best that Fenris can manage is to level his gaze to Ander’s mouth, his words as they heat the air between them and familiarizing it with his breath, teasing the lines of his lips and tickling the fine hairs on the elf’s skin. “I will.” A simple reply, the confidence behind it carrying a sharp clarity at everything he doesn’t say and doesn’t need to.


	43. Chapter 43

There’s an emergency in Darktown. An outbreak of fever, a noxious bloom of chokedamp spores, and at least two women in labor, one of them heartbreakingly young. Anders can’t stay, so there has been a changing of the guard, and Isabela is padding up the stairs as Anders shuts the side door behind him, heading off into cold and foggy streets. When Isabela enters the room she’s rubbing her upper arms and shivering theatrically. "Brrrrrrrrrrr! It’s enough to make a body think of getting some of those /things/ everyone keeps telling me about. What are they… pants?“ She flashes Fenris an easy smile and slides her rucksack off her shoulder as she saunters over to the bed.

 

The elf’s reaction to her entrance casts suddenly across his face, wide eyes with a sudden self consciousness. Jut as instantly he works his good hand under him to the mattress, slower and less steady than he intends, shoulder sloped upward as it takes his weight and hauls him upright, and he hides the flinch it causes. A part of him knows it’s a waste, that none of this facade will convince her and none of it will hide what he wants it to, but he can’t stand not trying. It’s the way they always were, he feels the slip into old habits, but it’s still fondness in his voice. “What are you doing here?”

"Anders needs to be at the clinic for a while. And besides, I hadn’t seen you since the fight, I wanted to check up on you.” Isabela is able to say it candidly, but while her voice is warm there’s no pity in her expression. Fenris would hardly abide that. Her pack hits the floor with a soft thwump and a sound suggesting it’s laden with books, and with it out of the way for a moment, Isabela takes a seat on the edge of the bed, facing Fenris. “I’d like you to explain to me why on earth you didn’t let that warm, willing apostate heal you up good as new. Every day you spend bedridden is a day you spend not fucking, and that’s a tragedy.” She tsks and shakes her head.

“By that you mean that you’re disappointed that you can no longer try to spy on us.” Fenris manages a smirk at that, notices its wide draw near one cheek, finds it odd that his emotions find themselves in check around Anders, while keeping appearances for Isabela is wholly different. “I didn’t want the easy way out. And I don’t want him used to it, either.”

“/Try/ to spy?” Isabela says archly. “From the look on his face as he walked out the door, I don’t think he likes this one bit. ” She tilts her head thoughtfully. “But either he respects your wishes or he’s utterly whipped.”

“I can’t imagine he would. Perhaps a lesson in patience would do him well.” The smirk fades with his somber tone, the ache in his side all too easy to dwell too deeply on. “Which do you think it is?”

“Bit of both, really.” Isabela shrugs. “Anything I’ve learned from talking to him, he wants to please you in everything he does and you don’t make it easy for him.”

“Was I supposed to?” The tone is faintly edged, defensive, and Fenris looks down the moment he says it, and adds with a mutter, “I would rather he not but I don’t know how to change it.”

“I don’t think that’s for me to say. I can’t spy on you -all- the time, sad as that is.” Isabela wears a smile that’s only partially sly.

“You would, if you weren’t distracted by Hawke.” Fenris drops his good elbow to his leg, his head to his palm to prop himself upright. He becomes more slumped than his bad posture usually allows, shoulders heavy and his bad side already trained to be as limp as it can, more exhaustion than he’s usually willing to admit when the alcohol wears off. “How is it, being with him?”

Isabela narrows her catlike eyes. “You think I’ll give up the juicy details for free when I know you’ve got so much to trade with?” She shakes her head. “Oh, alright, in the spirit of friendship I’ll tell you… I never thought it could be /better/ when it was serious. The man never lies. His face can’t lie, his body can’t lie, and I don’t know how he can be so good at cards with a shortcoming like that.”

Fenris raises his eyes, half-obscured by his brow before it follows suit slowly. "I don’t think I’ve ever heard you so dedicated to something unrelated to sex. Are you sure you’re well?“

"Unrelated to sex?” Isabela laughs at that. "I wouldn’t say that, not in the slightest.“

“I should have guessed.” Fenris pulls his chin up further, atop his knuckles. “What I intended, however…” And he pauses, trying to pull his words together, wrap his thoughts around relationship concepts that have never challenged him in the past, “..what is it like being committed to someone again? Moreso than we were.”

"You’ve probably guessed my marriage doesn’t provide a real basis for comparison,” Isabela replies. “Where to begin…” While she considers her words, Isabela bends down to open her knapsack, giving Fenris an enviable view down the front of her bodice. She’s taken to dressing a bit differently since becoming an Item with Hawke, but not at all in a way that covers more. “For starters,” she straightens again and sets a pile of dog-eared books on the nightstand. “I wouldn’t have expected it but I’m actually having -more- sex. More and better. I know it must get stale after a while but right now, it seems so hard to imagine. What about you and your blonde beaux?”

Of course, he tries to wander the topic and it lands right where they started, and he’s left drawing his raised eyebrow towards the books she’s setting down.  
But then, this is comfortable. He expected nothing less than comfortable from Isabela, nothing that would wither at the edges of his patience. “I don’t think I was expecting anything, or knew what I was supposed to expect out of this…” And that vaguery is nothing of what she really wants, so he adds, with a small smirk and a nod, “… he’s more than I could have hoped for. Truly.”

“He is -gifted-, isn’t he?” Isabela chuckles richly. The books don’t all have titles stamped on their spines, but a couple of them do. Titles like -The Lusty Orlesian Scullion-girl- or -Steamy Bathhouse Nights-. “They do have that reputation, Anders men. I’m impressed you manage to handle all of that. Makes me wish we’d… ah, well, no use pining over missed opportunities.” Isabela shakes her head a sighs, even though she’s grinning.

Fenris hadn’t noticed before, but usually whenever they spoke of sordid things there would be a drink perched in front of him to hide his eyes and loosen his tongue. Now there is neither, and his good hand finds the back of his neck as he coughs a surprised, awkward chuckle. “I could only say the same for you, couldn’t I?”

“And not a single comment about how stretched out I must be? You always were a classy one.” Isabela masks her affection with a jokingly flirtatious wink. Other titles in the pile include -The Enchanted Phallus of Urthemiel- and -Ardor Amongst the Aravels-, as well as its apparent sequel -Debauched Dalish Daliances-. “Now. Tell me what’s on your mind, or I’m going to start reading these to you. You have that look in your eye like you’re trying to say something but you need it dragged out of you, so consider me dragging.”

Both of Fenris’ eyebrows drop, a small perplexed alarm before he decidedly turns his full attention to Isabela, before he has to start asking questions he doesn’t want the answer to. Speaking candidly is preferable to finding out why there’s a decidedly elven bias in some of these titles. “You’re not free anymore. Does it bother you?”

Isabela knows Fenris’s choice of words is no coincidence. “I chose this. And every day I stay with him, I make that same choice. If it stops being a good choice, I can choose to go. I don’t feel fettered, even though at first I thought I would. I have to consider him now in the choices I make and not myself alone, but I know he also does the same. There’s a ‘bond’ between us – at least you can think of it that way – but it’s not a shackle. Sometimes it’s more of a lifeline.” Isabela trails off, her expression becoming open, tender, wistful before she snaps herself back to the present. “Are you feeling trapped?”

“I…” But Fenris is quick to shake his head. “No. I didn’t really understand it until now. Thank you.” And he pauses, putting thought to it and applying his jumbled feelings to what she’d said, gaze still distant as he replies. “Even a loose string reminds me of when I was. And I feel.. like I might not see the bad choices, if I made them.”

“Fenris.” Isabela says his name softly, just an expression of sympathy. “For what it’s worth… he cares about you. I think you chose a good person to trust, someone who will always think of what you want and what you need. You deserve to have a little faith in yourself as well.”

Fenris nods slowly, deliberately, as he looks up. “I do. I trust him with my life.” And everything that entails, that Anders wouldn’t let him make a bad choice, that Fenris would let him make those choices for him if it came to it. “And I know what I mean to him. It’s just new. That’s all it is.”

Isabela nods her understanding. “I’m getting sentimental now that I’m settling down. I think you two just might last, and I’m happy for you.”

Fenris sighs, another purposeful moment, like he’s forgotten how to survive idly without input, self conscious with all that spread out on the table. “Happy we are your entertainment whenever Hawke gets tired, you mean.”

“That too, but you do have a sweet smile when you think nobody’s watching. Also? Hawke never gets tired.” Isabela sits back with a satisfied smirk on her face.

Fenris scoffs. “If he doesn’t, you’ve missed the best part… and I do not.”

“Oh? Why don’t you, are you unhappy?” 

“No. I simply think your windows were too fogged.”

“No, really, Fenris.”

Fenris goes silent, taken so off guard he nearly answers without thinking, before he catches himself and pauses again. “Why?”

“Because it matters.” Isabela sighs, turning away to roll her shoulders and check the doors and windows as if wishing for an escape. “I hate to get 'serious business’ at a time like… anytime, really. But this business with Orana… Merrill’s fine but Orana’s broken up about things and she asked me to … intercede, I guess.”

Fenris glances down, any remaining smirk in his expression, even deep in his eyes fading. “What does she expect you to say?”

“I don’t know! I don’t think she knows either, poor girl. She wants a chance to talk to you but she’s afraid. Either she’s afraid she said something to actually hurt you, afraid she’s caving in too easily, or afraid you’re angry with her.” Isabela watches Fenris’s expression turn dull and closed and her shoulders slump, an apology written on her face.

His eyes only grow sterner from there, but still down, none of it for Isabela for being put in the middle. “She did. And it doesn’t matter. I’m not angry, but I doubt she’ll change my mind.”

“And just what is your mind so made up on? Forgive me if I’m a little confused. I try not to read too much into things, it’s a good habit to be in if one’s a liar.” Isabela gives Fenris a reproachful look.

“She wants me to apologize to a blood mage.” There’s more details, circumstances, reasons. But that’s what it really, really boils down to, the unmovable boulder in him.

“You do know Merrill is my friend, too?” Isabela taps her fingers together, feeling uncharacteristically awkward. Merrill is also perfectly able to speak for herself on matters like this. "And… I’m not sure that’s what she wants any more, just to make peace. She meant well but… Kitten’s mild but she can stand up for herself. She said she didn’t expect an apology and she doesn’t think she deserves one. “

Fenris settles his hand to the back of his neck, rubbing his skin uneasily. He realizes full well that Isabela is fond enough of both women if she’s doing this for them, and for once he stops to try to choose his words carefully. “Peace is fine. I have no argument with her, Anders wants her here.” It’s then that he glances up, an intensity to his gaze without anger behind it, the deep seated reasons behind his choices simply digging anchors into the dirt where they stand. “But don’t ask me to apologize. I realize she’s you’re friend, but… I’ve seen too much of blood magic to make amends with it.” 

Isabela nods slowly, meeting Fenris’s eyes with a steady gaze. "Can I tell Orana you’ll speak with her, then?” She pauses, having more to say but considering whether she should say it. "She… Her concern for where things stand between the two of you is that, she thinks you never give ground, and that she gives it too easily. “

“She’s welcome to come argue with me now, I barely have the energy for it.” The intensity fades and his eyes drop, with a small puff of air sighed, his hand falling and arm straightening to lean his weight on. “But whatever comes of it doesn’t matter. I’m used to living around someone that doesn’t agree with me.”

Isabela chuckles mildly at that and gives a slightly uncertain smile. "Then that’s settled, or as close to it as it’s going to be.” Her expression falters, and she finally lets out a heavy sigh. "I… I want you to know I’m not -against- you. I… shouldn’t have gotten involved with this, I’m sorry.“

“No, something likely needed to be said regardless. At any rate…” Fenris looks up again, with a really weak attempt at a smile, “…were you truly expecting I read these?”

"If you wanted to suffer, I thought I’d help? Or offer too, anyhow.” Isabela lifts her head again, mischief glinting in her eyes.

“Suffer that you know I can’t do anything until this is over?” Or perhaps that was the plan all along, make Anders heal him faster so they get back to her oft-scheduled entertainment.

“That’s the idea,” she chimes.

“You’re a cruel one, woman. I’ll be sure to pass them to Anders first.” And as much as he smirks at that, he fully intends to. Watching Anders squirm seems like such a fine idea.

“I may be cruel but you’re /wicked./” Isabela’s smile broadens and she pulls one book from the pile, moving it to the top. "Have him start with this one. He’ll -like- this one.“


	44. Chapter 44

Though Fenris is getting better, the wound slowly stabilizing and becoming more of a dull ache than a sharp puncture, Hawke has still orders him to remain at the mansion. Remain, and no fighting.  
It might slowly drive him insane to be so unhelpful for so long, and his friends make several references involving wild dogs in a pen, but on some level Fenris begins to grow accustomed to being sedentary. There’s no way Anders can keep him in bed without tying him down but at least the elf isn’t an idiot and moves slowly enough, favors one side until he can find a new book or just relocate to nap on the couch instead of the bed, where he’s memorized every imperfection in the ceiling and walls. Or slink to the kitchen for more wine.  
But for all his idling frustration, these walks are few and far between, and when he plants somewhere to sleep it usually entails a few more hours than intended.

Anders finds Fenris asleep on the couch when he makes it back from Darktown. He watches him, without a word, without a sound. Even in his sleep there’s something about Fenris’s face that has a sort of gravitas, as if he takes even his dreaming very seriously. He has an errant urge to follow him, one he realizes is rising up from within Justice. With a small, inward smile, Anders converses with his spirit, or perhaps communes. Often enough these days he can feel Justice’s thoughts before words take form, and the back and forth between them is more a reordering than an exchange. A faint blue glow rises, opposite the orange light from the embers in the hearth, as Justice steps to the fore. He moves around the couch, hefting more wood into the fire and stirring it until the logs kindle.

The elf wakes with a small start, a silent puff through his nose as his eyes crack open, glance around the room then settle on the only other person in the room. Fenris nearly asks why Anders is home somewhat early, though he stops himself when he realizes he likely just slept through more of the day than he thought. So instead he drags himself upright, palms to the cushions and one weaker than the other, followed by stretches that both make him wince but are much needed, and when he’s done the satisfactory looseness to his joints makes the pain worth it. Only then does he finally, really /look/ at Anders, that glow, and knits his brow. “Was there something you wanted?”

“To talk to you, if you’re willing.” Justice takes a seat on the couch, his back propped up against one arm and one leg bent to let him sit sideways. He pulls the tie out of Anders’ hair and lets it fall loose around his face. "Concerning… many nights ago. I gave insult without meaning to and then… retreated, to think. What I think is that there is more to be said.“ His voice is low and quiet, with that utter solemnity customary to him.

Fenris’ brow doesn’t relax, quite yet, though a smirk begins to pull at one corner of his lips. He shifts his weight, away from the edge of the couch and back, settling once more if they’re really going to talk as Justice intends. “I barely remember it. Why are you bringing it up now?”

"A number of reasons.” Justice regards Fenris calmly. Behind the lyrium glow, it’s hard to see where his gaze is pointed when he glances to the spot in Fenris’s side where he knows the wound is still mending. "You are… a most uncommon man. Since Anders and I joined, I have been regarded with such horror by all who have known of me. For a long time even Anders was ashamed. He believed he had made me a demon. And I knew I had made him an abomination.“  
"If he had felt himself outcast, or I had felt myself lost, we became a hundredfold moreso as we left the Wardens. To find friends in Kirkwall was beyond Anders’ hopes. But even the others see me as a quirk of his, a defect, a problem he lives with. Perhaps that -is- what I am now. But anyone else… we never expected that you would try to know us this way. That you would not do your best to forget me, or to wish me destroyed or banished from him, or at least never to be reminded that I am here. He has tried to tell the others I am a part of him… but you, I believe, are the only one to understand.”

Fenris leans right back forwards at that, with a conscious slowness, chin perching in the crook of his thumb and forefinger. The smirk fades, replaced with something more critical though not stern, eyes trying to focus on the movements of Anders’ pupils behind the glow, even when he knows there’s no use to trying to track them. “Perhaps…” It’s his words that make him turn his gaze, head shifting to look at the fireplace, the radiating heat no longer touching his ear and for a moment it feels freezing. “..the others haven’t encountered many demons. None that they don’t have to fight.”

“I understand why they feel as they do. I bear them no grudge. But you have been, as I said, exceptional. There has been nothing to compel you to… include me. Nothing but your love for Anders, driving you to understand even the aspects of him that frighten you. If you rejected me I would understand why. It may even be what I deserve. But you have not. Whatever your feelings towards me, your actions have made you so dear…” Justice trails off, his voice roughened with feeling. He looks down and away, his glance disclosed by the motion of his eyelids. “I have seen beauty in this world and ugliness, and I have seen how thought and feeling color it. I would not wish to live in this world without you. I do not know if I can die, but if you should fall… I would wish to follow.”

Fenris’ hand drags from his chin, a movement that begins slow as Justice goes quiet, momentarily touching his cheek and instantly reminded of Anders’ stubble, but then past, and cards his fingers through his hair until they’re thoroughly knit alongside his scalp. “I do it because it would be incorrect not to. But… what are you saying, exactly?” It sounds like something Fenris is familiar with, of course, as he finally looks up to Justice’s eyes. The question even seems unfair. But he certainly isn’t familiar with a demon ever outright saying it.

“Few people do what is right simply because it is right,” Justice answers. "I am saying… we were terrified of losing you, the day you were injured. All that kept us together was Anders throwing himself into his efforts to protect and heal you. And I am saying… thank you, and I am saying… I love you.“ Justice draws in a deep breath and lets it out slowly. "You told me once not to say that to you. Forgive me if it is unwelcome. I will speak no more of this if you do not wish me to. Command me to go, and I shall.”

Silence comes instead. No words as Fenris drops his hand to the couch and leans his weight to it, wincing as he moves his hips closer, far slower than he wants but still faster than he has been in a month. His other arm swings up quicker, hooks across Justice’s back to pull him closer. And stops, their faces inches apart, Fenris hesitating and momentarily critically glancing over Anders’ features, features not colored by the mage and harder to read, and wanting to find acceptance from both. Then he finally settles on their lips, and closes the space between them.

Justice’s eyes close. He accepts Fenris’s kiss with a soft sigh, echoing with Anders’ voice, and his arms encircle Fenris’s shoulders. He shifts close, wary of Fenris’s injury but bringing their bodies together, open palms on Fenris’s back. He tips his head forward, forehead to forehead in between kisses.

They continue, each meeting somewhat more energetic than the last, each careful but frenzied, each pressing a bit harder forward. He pulls them closer until their chests are flush together, his small gasps for air as Justice exhales, sharing their breath and heat. Until his side finally protests, between his muscles and his lungs, and he lets his head drop to lean against Justice’s while he forces himself to slow down, eyes turned away as if it were rude to look from this proximity, or hiding his frustration. “What do you feel for him?”

“I love him. I feel… protective. I’ve felt the pain he’s known in his life. I know his frivolities and foibles, his hopes and fears… and the good intentions that underlie all that he does, even when those intentions are frustrated or foolish. If I could keep him safe from harm I would. I attempt to. At the very least he will not be alone again. And he is warm… I hold him close, within our soul, and he holds me in return. He lets me feel tenderness, and gratitude, and fascination, and so many other things that we share.” Justice shifts gingerly, arranging their limbs so Fenris can lie against his chest.

“If he’s that to you…” Fenris doesn’t take the easy offer at first, only from his own stubbornness, and when he finally sinks, when the ache presses drags him to lean to Justice, it’s with a reluctance and a lamed glare. “…then I shouldn’t get between you.”

“And if we are one person, how could there be jealousy between us? How do my feelings for him diminish those I have for you, or vice versa?” Justice gives Fenris a puzzled look, and then sighs. "Have I said something very foolish again?“

"No.” The elf picks himself up and back to supporting his own weight, this time ignoring the throb just under his ribs. These days it feels like a heavy rock placed inside him, something he had to move around lest it settle precariously within him. “It was fine.”

Justice frowns slightly as Fenris pulls away. "I still have much to learn, clearly.“ He pulls himself upright as well, still moving slowly. Even without Fenris and his injured flank to worry about, he still remembers all too clearly how wary of him Fenris has been in the past.

"Evidently.” Fenris eyes level on the fire, bright glints of orange on his green eyes, and then they turn further, his chin following and his body following suit as he carefully stands and walks away towards the kitchen without a word.

Justice watches Fenris walk away, sitting on the edge of the couch with his elbows braced against his knees. The glow in his eyes gutters out as he retreats, leaving Anders there with the bitter aftertaste of his hurt. After a long, silent moment, the mage pushes himself to his feet and stalks off to his study, shutting the door quietly behind him.

For a time the mansion lays quiet, as it had been once long ago, leaving only Fenris to his thoughts and a bottle of wine. This had been what was comfortable for so long, a silence he took solace in, so why does it eat at him now, tatter the edges of his mind the same way this ache does, the same way being so sedentary does. These days it only reminds him who isn’t at his side.  
Instead of cooling when left alone with a bottle this time he burns, a hole in his chest not unlike his wound, that for once he wants to say something, put words to this agony and frustration and not being able to.  
Glass shatters in the kitchen, exploding on stone, eventually followed by softer steps that lead Fenris to the the study, eyes down as he opens the door.

There are hands on Fenris’s shoulders almost immediately. Anders is out of his chair even before he hears the latch, and he pulls Fenris into the room, into his arms if he’ll allow it. “Tell me,” comes the soft request. “And for pity’s sake tell me you threw that with your good arm.”

Fenris doesn’t fight the pull in the slightest, forehead sunk to Anders’ shoulder as soon as the opportunity arises, almost limp if he weren’t standing. He sighs weakly, defeatedly, and most of all some sort of hypocrite. “I can’t compete with that.”

“There is no bloody competition. I am yours, I am so very yours, I am completely and utterly yours, and I haven’t the smallest regret about it, or the slightest doubt. I love you and adore you and I need you and I will never, ever stop.” Anders closes his arms around Fenris, enfolds him in his embrace and squeezes him fiercely. He cups the back of Fenris’s head to press it over his heart, and he lowers his face to press his lips against his hair. “I have never found you lacking. I have never found you wanting. And there is no competition, there never has been. It has always been -you- and it always will be. My love.”

When Fenris returns the hug his arms are clinging, clutching the back of Anders’ clothes, as if he would slip away with the slightest breeze regardless of how sure he’s felt about this before. This felt like so much stable unquestionable ground when he was the one assuring. A long and built up sigh breathes against the mage’s chest, deflating the tension in the elf’s shoulders. "I should apologize. I’m a fool, I shouldn’t have left.“

"You’re not a fool, everyone needs reassurances sometimes.” Anders rubs his palms along Fenris’s back, the best compromise he can find between keeping him pressed close and needing to touch him. “And it’s hard to explain but… there’s all the difference in the world between the rapport my headmate and I have managed to find out of necessity, and the passion I feel for the only one I wanted badly enough to abandon all better judgment for and pursue, and court, and fall head over heels in love with. There isn’t any competition. You won me before it could’ve even started.” Anders bends down then, at the waist and at the knees, to scoop Fenris into his arms. “This conversation needs to continue in bed.”

“Mage pathice..” The words come as a sharp grumble as Fenris gives a small struggle, stronger than he was when Anders started doing this but giving in just as fast, his good arm relaxing round the mage’s shoulderblades. His grumble weakens to a sigh of easy defeat, followed by a weaker “thank you.” as he lets his head drop to the mage, ear pressed to one shoulder.

Fenris will be well enough to start turning the tables on him again soon, and his struggle is a pleasing reminder of that. “I didn’t quite catch that,” Anders murmurs as he strides out of his study with Fenris cradled in his arms, finally huffing and puffing a bit as he lopes up the stairs two at a time. When he reaches their room he glances down at the head resting on his shoulder, Fenris’s refined features and his large eyes downcast. His heart swells, ready to burst at the seams with everything he’s professed, but it’s a pleasant ache, a giddy one. He lays Fenris down across the bed and joins him on it as soon as he can manage to kick off his boots.

“Thank you, or that I called you a fucking mage.” Despite looking settled enough in Anders’ grasp once Fenris is set to the bed he props himself up with his hands heeled into the mattress, an indignant look leveled on the other man. That is, until Anders manages to join at his side, and as he carefully bends at the elbows to let himself down slow, he turns midway to lean over and plant a kiss on Anders’ lips. And he pauses there after he breaks it, barely an inch between their lips. “I still feel I should apologize. To both of you.”

“That’s the word for ‘fucking’? Learn something new every day…” Anders grins, then softly “mmm’s” at the kiss Fenris gives him. "We accept,“ he answers with a quiet echo. "We didn’t realize until we heard glass breaking how upset you were, and for that, we’re sorry.” All it takes is a tilt of his chin to touch his lips to Fenris’s once more. "And if it helps at all… if Justice and I were suddenly cleft in twain once more, we -both- would be courting you relentlessly.“

Fenris uses his elbow to roll his weight away from Anders, so he can rest back to the mattress and side flat. The only position where it really stops bothering him for any length of time. But that doesn’t bar him from croaking an awkward chuckle, head tipping towards Anders but eyes toward the ceiling. "You’re so certain I would survive that. One is enough.” Once the sentence trails away he finally glances down, an awkward humor turning lighter, more casual in his eyes. “…and not quite 'fucking’.. but I don’t think there is any trade word for it.”

“Is it something I’m actually guilty of doing? And if I haven’t done it yet, describe it to me so I can try.” Anders is grinning again as he pulls himself close to Fenris. He takes in the warm look in his eyes, but then his gaze wanders over the lithe body stretched out beside him on the bed and he sighs with unmistakable longing.

“The… receiving partner, generally speaking. So yes. You have.” Fenris nearly looks away with that horribly embarrassing explanation, but his eyes catch on Anders’ gaze, and he lingers on it. “How much longer, do you think?” It’s a sudden, though soft question, the first time Fenris has shown even the slightest impatience to healing the old fashioned way.

“The worst is done. Maybe another week and a half, plus a few days practice to limber yourself up again before you’re ready to fight.” Anders pauses, bringing his gaze back to Fenris’s face. “You could certainly …er… endure a climax even now so long as you held still during the process…”

Fenris nearly chokes, and lets his head sink back into the pillow to stare at the ceiling with a mutter. A week or so sounds like an eternity, worse from how close it is. “'Endure a climax?’ Hardly, with what I want to do to you by now.”

Anders makes a sound in his throat that starts out a lascivious growl and ends in a pleading moan. He rolls onto his back, hands under head head to keep them from wandering. “This /sucks/.”

“It could be worse.” Fenris chuckles lightly at Anders’ frustration, how it mirrors his own but so openly. “What would an abomination do, all coin spent between healing people and food and The Rose too rich.“

“I’ll tell you what he’d do. He’d masturbate chronically is what he’d do. Any time he got a minute to himself he’d find a dark, private corner where he could quickly, quietly stroke himself off with no one the wiser, and if he was guaranteed a few hours of real privacy, then he’d get adventurous. Fill his head with daydreams and take his time, lingering right at the edge until it was -perfect-…” Anders smiles, watching Fenris out of the corner of his eye. His own penis stirs, his tease threatening to backfire on him.

The elf sighs deeply, parting his lips as the air escapes him, either from content or to cool his own interest. Probably both. A smirk pulls at those lips the moment they close, gaze hardly wandering from the ceiling but unfocused. “Entirely shameless, then. And your… 'guest’?”

“Utterly disgusted by me and my fantasies, I assure you.” Anders grins. “But eventually he had to admit I was pretty good at not getting caught. He would demand to know what I found so compelling about sex in the first place, but he started shutting up when I began fantasizing about -you- more. You and Nathaniel Howe, those were the two he could really get into. He’d only snap at me for jerking off to somebody I had no real feelings for, which used to piss me off… and then you ended up bending me over your bathroom counter and I had to admit it was better when there were feelings involved. The only thing that gets me off harder than thinking of you is being with you, now.”

That smirk, only a hint before now settles to its place, deep and honest and creasing Fenris’ cheek at one corner. “/Nathaniel?/ You’ve never mentioned him before. I a-” Fenris cuts himself off before he even finishes the next word, nearly raises a hand to wave the unfinished sentence away but even stopping that short. “He never returned your interest, evidently. Who was he?”

“A friend of mine in the Wardens. An archer like Sebastian, and he had that kind of build too, broad in the shoulders and lean at the waist.” Anders smiles as he remembers long hours spent just quietly staring at the man from behind – a sight enjoyable enough to dull the edge of anxiety that being in the deep roads always gave him. “Only noble I ever liked, before Hawke. Very honorable, disciplined, loyal… As for whether I was interested in him, I liked him and I -really- liked his body, but it was just… the wrong time, the wrong place. He didn’t want casual sex and I didn’t want serious romance. Justice was close to him, though. There were warm feelings between them. I’m surprised Justice came to me instead of him, but Justice always tells me I needed him more.”

“Mm, perhaps you did.” Fenris looks ready to ask more, if he ever did find anyone, but this time he does raise his hand, to censor himself. “I’m sorry, I’m asking too many questions.” His hand drops, slipping between the back of his neck and the pillow, rubbing at his skin lightly and managing to look just as awkward as he feels despite laying down. “I don’t mean to insist to know every detail of who you’ve thought about.”

Anders chuckles dryly. “Who haven’t I thought about.” He rolls to his side, deciding it’s well bast time he curled up against Fenris. “I don’t mind if you ask. And I won’t lie to you, either. I’m… a bit curious what your fantasies are like, to be honest.” As he snuggles up against Fenris’s side he rests his head in the crook of his arm. “You’re better, you know. All my best fantasies are of you, and being with you tops any daydream I could come up with. Don’t try and diminish the compliment, I enjoy masturbation more than anyone I know, except Isabela.” 

The reaction from Fenris is torn so perfectly, his head turning away with an embarrassed huff while his shoulder turns to. Eventually one side of the emotional argument wins and he turns back to the mage, white hair shuffling and falling about his forehead while he presses the top edge of his nose to the blond. “My fantasies were just memories. Nothing so creative.”

“Well, we’ve already established you had a more exotic sex life than I did.” Anders lifts his head until he can kiss Fenris’s chin, just between the lines that curl along it. He drapes an arm across Fenris’s body to give him a cautious hug.

Fenris dips his head just enough to pass their lips together, something that could be only barely considered a kiss and closer to a caress. “Exotic is one word you could call it.” But something nags at him, something he’d pushed away a few minutes ago, and reluctantly, quietly, he adds, “You never thought of Karl, then? Before you came here.”

“I did but… it would always make me miss him.” Anders shuts his eyes and his sigh is deep and heavy with regrets. “Always made me sad, or sometimes bitter, and… not really the best the cocktail of things when all you want is a quick come. Maker, he was…” Anders chokes on his words. “Sometimes I still wonder if it could have worked out, if we hadn’t been in the Circle.”

“Don’t.” Fenris picks up his good arm to place a hand through Anders’ hair, and firmly pushes them together into a deeper kiss, hints of his own frustrated passion seeping through. Something to bring Anders’ mind back to the present before it starts wandering too far down what ifs and what could have beens. “I shouldn’t have brought it up.”

Anders makes a small sound in his throat, sweet and grateful, and his arm holds tight around Fenris’s ribs, taking hold of the reminder that he’s here, in the present, and not alone. "It’s alright. I… sometimes it’s good, to be able to talk about him. You might have liked him, even if he was a mage. He was mild… very principled, intelligent and mature…not very much like me, but so much of what I thought I should’ve been, especially when we were together. I admired him.“

Fenris relaxes again as Anders eases, hand sinking back to limply rest on the mattress, his forehead dipping until it touches the mage’s chin. On some instinctive level he doubts that they would have been friends but finds himself muttering “Perhaps.” anyway without even thinking about it.


	45. Chapter 45

There’s more mud than dirt to the paths lining the Wounded Coast. At some point gravel had been thrown down in an attempt to ease the way for carriages, but that was long ago and after many washouts the only rocks left serve as small obstacles Fenris keeps absently wary of.  
The sun lingers even this late, after another one of Hawke’s battles, and this time Fenris had managed to force his way into joining them again. It was easy to convince their leader, less so the mage, a fact the elf had clearly resented for the rest of the day. Everything had to turn difficult, the elf suddenly hard of hearing, but only for anything Anders said. Even when everyone else had started to pick their way home, and instead Fenris had detoured to these trails, with little explanation beyond a boiling glare.  
Evening would be setting in soon, but nobody seemed fit to bother two men covered in red, the elf somewhat moreso, and neither of them looking worse for it. None of the bands seemed near in any case, their fires lighting on distant hills for the night.

 

Anders follows a few steps behind, and anyone watching would suspect a small thundercloud just a bit further back on the trail. Sometimes he scowls at the elf’s back, and sometimes he seems to frown at nothing in particular, getting lost in his own thoughts. The grey late-winter sky has been darkening, though, and the air is cold, and after at least the dozenth time wondering where the elf thinks he’s going when the city is in the other direction, he decides to try asking again. “It’s getting dark. We should be heading back to hightown. Whatever you’re trying to prove just consider it done and let’s go where it’s warm.”

Fenris stops, finally. He turns back, halfway, a thick spray of blood across one cheek and trailing to the corner of his lips. “You can turn back, if you’re so eager.” There’s a small pause, but when he moves again instead of continuing forward he walks off the trail, picking his way through the tall grass to the short shoreline. Though it went unnoticed until now he wipes his palm through the blood on his face, succeeding in mostly nothing but smearing the red around in his irritation.

“And leave you out here alone, oh yes, that’s a fine idea.” Anders scoffs. He stands still for a moment, balking, as Fenris leaves the trail, rigid and angry and wishing he could hold the other back like an anchor. But in the end he gives in and follows, as if he were leashed. “So can you give me some kind of an estimate, at least, on when you’re going to get bored being cross with me? I’m already sick of being ignored but I suppose I can stick it out for a few more hours if the end’s in sight.”

“Is that what this is to you? Something I think you should just endure until I’m satisfied?” The elf’s voice rises with his words, even as he unslings his sword from his shoulder. The metal sinks with him, blade shoved forward as he crouches to wash off his hands, one of the two soaking and sending curls of crimson into the water. ”How much longer will I have to ‘stick it out’ for you to trust me again?”

“Trust you? What did I do that you think I don’t trust you, do you think I’m following you around because I think you’re going to cheat the minute I turn my back? I wouldn’t leave Hawke’s -dog- out here alone after dark.” Sandy soil crunches under booted feet as Anders steps up behind Fenris, gazing down over the elf’s shoulder.

“That you have any say in what I decide is telling enough, mage.” Fenris’ words are a growling grumble, and now that his hands are clean he goes silent as he splashes water to his face. It catches his hair too, slicks his bangs to his forehead. “If you think I intend to wait for you every day…”

“Don’t act like I don’t have some kind of stake in what happens to you! I noticed you limping when you got out of bed, and you’re still not eating as much as you ought to be. If I have to lose you I’d like it to at least be to something other than pride and stupidity.” Anders’ blandishments lose some of their steam as he watches clean water roll off Fenris’s face, and the way his pale hair turns silvery and almost translucent when it’s wet. The way they can’t hide the smooth perfect contours of his face when they’re plastered down and back this way. His breath catches in his throat, and his eyes show longing as much as reproachfulness.

Fenris straightens almost immediately, already launched and doesn’t even notice Anders’ shift of expression even when he faces it down, inches away. “That’s not trusting me! I can’t just wait until you think it safe for me again. It /never will be/, if you leave me to rot in that mansion another day.”

“It isn’t you I don’t trust!” Anders snaps. He raises his hands, grips Fenris by the biceps. “It’s Kirkwall, its Thedas, it’s the Maker I don’t trust! I won’t let the only good thing in my world be taken away from me!”

“No. You knew something could happen, but it didn’t matter to you until you needed to take control of it.” Fenris pulls away gruffly, but for all the force put into it he only breaks one arm from Anders’ hands. “This isn’t your choice.”

The hand still gripping Fenris’s arm tightens almost to the point of bruising, then lets go and drops to Anders’s side. His gaze drops away with it, landing on the shimmering surface of the water. “Very well. Do as you please. And you may as well do it out of my sight, since I can’t even offer to help you without you taking offense.”

The deeply set scowl sits, glare sharp enough to pull the corners of Fenris’ lips in a snarl, anger and energy leftover from fighting, and yet it begins to soften while Anders isn’t looking. Finally he goes quiet, the silence broken by the soft rustling of grass and the gulp at his throat when he steps close again, enough to feel the heat of Anders’ breath. “I-..” Fenris’ sentence falls short so easily, and he huffs in frustration, then leans closer to press his frown to the mage’s mouth. “That’s not what I meant. Or want.”

Anders feels warm lips against his own. Like ripples spreading over the surface of a pond the warmth of that kiss spreads over his face in a startled blush. He’s silent until Fenris speaks, and when he answers his voice is hushed and slightly breathless. “Then… may I go on being the one to watch your back? It makes me feel like my magic might have a use, and besides, the view is fantastic.”

“As if you don’t already.” The sigh that passes Fenris’ nostrils is long, controlled, anger steaming with it until the elf sinks back to a cool glare. Not toward the mage, his eyes shifting to some otherwise unimportant place of dirt and tall grass, and he remains where he is. “Alright. As long as you keep it well away from me.”

Anders bows his head, leaning forward just enough to make their foreheads touch. “I’ll be good,” he promises, his tone mild and earnest in spite of the wryness in his wording. “Wherever you wish to lead, I’ll follow.”

Fenris sighs again, this time short and through his lips, exhausted and a puff of frustration. His shoulders slump at his sides even still, diffusing and then some until he feels no energy left in his chest. “Don’t, I would lead you in circles. I still hardly have an idea of what I /want/.”

“I’m just as content to wait while you figure it out.” Anders encircles Fenris with his arms, not pulling him closer but letting the weight of the hug settle on Fenris’s shoulders. “And if you want me to offer suggestions, well… I have plenty of ideas, of widely varying quality?”

As the elf’s mood cools his eyes finally begin to drift from the spot of grass behind them, back up to Anders’. “I’m listening, as long as you keep them realistic.” Before he can lock their gaze Fenris catches sight of a spot of gore clinging to one feather, and he reaches up to pick it off as he gently backs up. The offending glob is flicked away, but it still leaves a mark on his fingers to scowl at. “..while I clean off the blood on me. Do you often think about what I should do?”

“Sometimes I let myself think about what kind of life I’d like to have. If we ever move on from Kirkwall, where we could go, how we could live.” Anders kisses the corner of Fenris’s mouth before the elf turns away to wash. He sits down on dried, fallen log blasted pale by the salt winds off the sea, and he looks out to where the moon hangs low above the horizon, looking brilliant and oversized. “Sometimes I think we could go to some distant city, maybe Antiva, and be lost in the crowds. Find ourselves simple jobs, some small row-house with thick walls and two fireplaces. Other times I think we should leave the world behind. Find some cottage in the mountains, hunt for game and furs, maybe plow a small garden or an orchard. Or take over some remote orlesian chateau and live out our lives as a couple of vintners. Maybe raise some sheep.”

“Not Antiva. Or Orlais.” Fenris crouches back down by his sword left in the water, and as he turns it over the blade churns up clouds of sand and blood. “Do you think you could finally do that? Settle somewhere and stay there with nothing to do?”

“I don’t know. I’d like to, but, Justice…” Anders slumps forward a bit, elbows braced on his knees, and shakes his head. “I think I had this conversation with the warden commander once. Told him I just wanted a good hot meal and a pretty girl. I wasn’t being entirely honest. But I do want /you/, and … a home together, someday, Maker willing.”

Fenris stops, enough to look over his shoulder, gauntlets soaked through and leather freezing with seawater but less of a mess for it. “You wanted /‘a pretty girl’/?”

“So far as I cared for anybody in Ferelden to know.” Anders shifts uncomfortably, turning his collar up and pulling it snug to his bare neck. “I thought… I hoped… if I could convince the Wardens i was just like anybody else, not some deviant, effeminate wizard…” He laughs flatly and shakes his head again. “Well, nobody bought it, anyway.”

Whatever answer that was it seems to satisfy Fenris, as he turns back to rub drying blood off his chest then finally standing with his sword in tow. “Did it make a difference?”

“I don’t think it did. The Warden Commander was the one who conscripted me, and… I always got the sense with him that he made his choices according to what he thought he could live with, not whether or not he liked you. Principled, I guess you could say.” Anders has his eyes on the brush, the trail they left behind, even while he speaks.

The blade is given a final sharp shake, the last clods of sand kicking off it and dropping back into the water with small splashes. A final haul over his shoulder and it settles back at Fenris’ back, this time beginning to look too heavy even for him, the elf’s collarbone and arms weary as he makes his way up the few steps from the water to the aged wood. “And yet you left.”

“He left, first. And those that took his place weren’t the same. The Templars kept coming. I was more trouble than I was worth.” Anders frowns as he speaks. His expression clouds over, as if his defenses don’t seem like enough even to him, tonight. "Still. I did a piss poor job of repaying his faith in me.“

“Probably. But I suppose we all do that at some point or another.” As Fenris passes the twisted stump of the log he blindly offers a hand, his gaze following Anders’ and scanning the path for anyone that might bother them between here and Kirkwall. “Are we going?” As if he hadn’t been the one to lead them out this far in the first place.

Anders nods. He pulls his coat straight as he rises to his feet, and he heads back through the brush to the trail. "Let’s get back. Aveline tells me that Meredith has been sending Templar patrols out even this far. What she thinks she’ll find, I’ve no idea.”

“You, maybe. If she thinks mages would rather try their luck with bandits and the cold wind than Templars.” Fenris follows the man’s lead, lets Anders carve a path through the long grass as much as he wants. “Are you afraid of them?”

“Afraid of what I’ll do if they cross paths with us.” Anders bites off the short reply and holds his coat shut with one hand, his head ducked down against a strengthening wind. "But no, she’s not looking for me. She could have had me a dozen times in the past year alone but … for some mad reason they leave me be. It’s probably something to do with Hawke.“

“As much as the madness, I imagine.” There’s a small sigh at the mage’s back, almost lost between the splashes of shoreline and rustling wind, but while Fenris shadows closer he doesn’t reach out to stop Anders. As much as a part of him wants to. “Then what is it?”

"The Mage Underground. The secret ways out of the gallows, out of Kirkwall.” Anders leads the way back up the trail with long strides. "There are so few of us left as it is, since Meredith started her executions. But they never stop, they never will, not until the last of us has been put to the sword. And -still- the others won’t fight. They won’t flee and they won’t fight, what do they -expect- to happen?!“

“I certainly hope you don’t expect any wisdom from me about it. What do you expect them to do about it, exactly? Flee the city, and go where? To Tevinter?”

"Anywhere but here. Anywhere would be better, with the way things in Kirkwall have become.”

“Would any other circle house an apostate unwilling to go back to the city they belong to?”

“No, of course not.”

“Then there is nothing for them out there than there is here.”

“They might not be hunted so relentlessly, if they hide, if they live quietly and peaceably.” Anders shakes his head, stray locks of hair whipping across his face.

“They don’t know that. And you’ve never wanted to live ‘quietly’.”

“Then what do -you- suggest, Fenris? Given that it’s too late for any of us to manage not being born in the first place.” Anders shoots a glare over his shoulder at the elf.

Fenris doesn’t even falter from it, the aggression returned with a cool look. “My point is that there may not /be/ anything to suggest. They may not see reason to leave and they may die for it… but I understand it. What will you do then?”

“Grieve,” Anders snaps. He turns away, posture stiff against the wind as the walls of the city loom up before them.

“Good. The faster you accept this as a possibility the less surprised you will be, regardless of what happens.”

“You think I’m ever surprised to find out about more mages falling to Templar blades?”

“I wasn’t aware you’ve witnessed something quite on this scale.”

“What does the scale of it matter? It’s always monstrous.” There’s less of an edge to Anders’ voice, less sharpness but more grief. He still keeps his head down, right up until the city walls give some shelter from the wind, but now his posture seems slumped, closing in as if he’s wincing from a blow about to fall on him.

“Anders..” Fenris’ words trail off there, before he even started, and he sighs in frustration with himself. That he can’t find any better words about this, each one awkward and more grinding than the last. “It’s… different. I want to know that you’ll be ready for what might happen.”

Anders halts, looks back over his shoulder. "I… I don’t know if I can be. I don’t know what difference it makes if I am. This can’t go on and yet it does and nobody raises a hand to stop it.“

Fenris stops, only allows them to now that they’re within the city’s walls and the stone echoes with any footsteps, and stares back. “It makes a difference to me.”

Anders meets Fenris’s gaze, steady somehow in spite of everything. "Then I will try.”

For a few long moments Fenris is silent, eyes still sharp despite his tone, but at length he looks away. “Thank you.” Without another word to it he continues on, casting another glance towards the mage he passes before taking the lead.


	46. Chapter 46

Anders leans against the alley wall in lowtown, trying to catch his breath. He turned to look back down the passage behind him but there was neither sight nor sound of pursuit. In spite of the broken arrow shaft buried in his thigh, he was more and more certain it hadn’t been him they’d come for. If it had, they could have had him. But instead of a trap, it was a rout, workers and patients in the clinic blocking the Templars with their bodies to give him time to flee. Mercifully he hadn’t heard them cry out as the the Templars cut them down – he’d heard only the captain’s firm proclamation of their arrest. But even if they were simply alive and captive in the gallows, the penalty for harboring an Apostate was death. They wouldn’t be alive for much longer.

 

Donnic had stopped by. He often did, and Fenris was never quite sure why the man seemed to prefer his company. Perhaps the cards were just better and the wine free. It was altogether no cause for suspicion when he walked into the mansion with barely a knock to announce himself.  
This time his lips turned downward, face steely and grim, but it was his shoulders Fenris noticed. Squared and stiff, the way Donnic always did when work was involved.  
Aveline had more news regarding the Templars, and thankfully had more sense than to immediately run to the mansion herself. What he said sent Fenris out as soon as he could fetch his sword, all but running. Donnic lingered longer, if only to draw less attention when he followed suit at a much slower pace. Someone Aveline trusted had to inspect the damage.  
The entire way Fenris glanced towards the Templars he passed. They all seemed distracted, and all beginning to ease their way towards darktown without raising too much attention. So they thought there would be something to worry about. The regular stock of darktown wasn’t something to worry about.  
It’s a smell that makes him stop in his tracks, in the middle of the road and obvious. The dust of lowtown clods his nose but nothing mistakes the familiar whiffs of darktown trailing up here, sulfurous and mixing with the more usual piss and vomit. And a metallic note of blood.  
The smell leads him, carefully towards a back alley and only after nobody in armor is around much less paying attention to some elf. His hand comes to rest along the handle of his sword as he turns the corner, wary and footsteps silent, suddenly painfully aware that he’d managed to grab none of his armor in the rush out.  
“/Anders!/”  
The name is quiet and hissed, Fenris at the mage’s side and tightly grabbing hold of his shoulder. “What happened?”

Anders leans against the support that Fenris’s body offers. The shaft of the broken arrow falls from his bloody hand, his magic called as quietly, covertly as he can manage to heal the wound. "Templars raided the clinic. This time they’re making arrests. Knight Captain Cullen looked me right in the eye and just… let me run. Let the others… take the fall for me.“ Anders’ face screws tight with rage and anguish and guilt. He grits his teeth to keep himself from screaming, flickering fissures of blue light chasing eachother over his skin.

With a tighter grip on Anders’ shoulder Fenris glances him over, then back past his shoulder. There’s no sound of running footsteps, no clanging of metal and pounding thick leather boots against the dirt, but that doesn’t mean there won’t be soon. “We need to move. They won’t all be so generous. Varric will have a room in The Hanged Man we can use.”

It takes time for Fenris’s words to register. Anders stays still, eyes fixed on the ground at his feet, teeth clenching so hard they threaten to crack. He sucks in a breath, lets it out, and the fissures of blue retreat. He grunts as he forces himself to straighten and put weight on his injured leg. "Move? No, we need to fight! I can’t let the Templars do this, I can’t let these people die for me. We need Hawke! We need Aveline, and Isabela, and the rest!”

“None of it will matter if the Templars find you first!” Fenris may have nothing but his sword but his grip is all the firmer for it, uncomfortably tight when he doesn’t have to worry about his gauntlets digging at skin. “Listen. If you can move, you need to get out of sight. Now. We can talk about what to do later.”

Anders’s shoulder aches under Fenris’s hand, his grip tight enough to make the bones grind. “…All right. Fine.” He pauses, catching his breath as he lets his magic dissipate, the wound in his thigh sore but not bleeding. “You lead and I’ll follow. Varric can send for the others once we’re inside.”

With some reluctance Fenris wills his hand open and lets go, dropping it and leaving the space on Anders’ shoulder almost cold with his absence as the blood rushes into place. He nods once and turns down the alley, heading out into the open street and pausing to look back as the coast is clear. At least one of the side doors to the tavern is only across the way.

Anders watches, hunched in the shadows of the lowtown walls, and waits for Fenris’s nod. He limps, but he limps briskly, hurrying to the elf’s side and then to the door, flattening his back against the wall beside it. There are lamps lit, dim and flickering, outside the tavern. They cast enough light to show a bruise on Anders’ cheekbone, and a bloody split lip.

With hardly a parting glance to see if they’ve been spotted Fenris pulls the door open. If he didn’t notice the extent of the damage he certainly does now, the light spilling out into the darkness. Regardless he doesn’t react to it, not now, though when he catches Anders’ shoulder to pull him inside the touch is somewhat gentler. The back hallway is empty, save some couple at the far end that didn’t manage to make it to their room before drunkenly pawing at each other.

If the pair in the hall notice them, they give no sign of it, all heavy breathing and muffled moans. Anders follows Fenris through the door, along the familiar hallway. He slouches, in places like these, trying to take up less space under the low-beamed ceilings and choosing one wall to lean his shoulder against and keeping his head down. He knocks on Varric’s door when they reach it, then tries the latch. Varric has told him before that his door is always open, but this is the first time Anders has ever tried him at his word.

The door falls open easily with a loud creak as the only alarm, apparently even to the elf’s surprise. Inside is Varric, sure enough, chair tipped back and his booted ankles crossed over the table as he works a cloth over Bianca to keep the crossbow pristine as always. The meticulous work pauses as he looks up, first to the elf and then settling on the mage, who looks to be rather worse for wear. Not that he has to venture much of a guess. “The Templars..?”

“No, Aveline found out I made a pass at Donnic.” Anders doesn’t miss a beat, but the bitter edge under his voice bleeds the humor out of his words. He shuts the door behind them before he continues. “They’re making arrests… all the help at the clinic. They’ll be executed if we don’t do something.” 

It’s more than enough reason to pull Varric to his feet, Bianca slung to his shoulder. “Did they see you?”  
Fenris shoots that question a wary glare, on edge from the whole matter. “They saw enough.”  
“Alright, alright. I’ll get more of us here. Elf, you keep blondie here so he doesn’t do anything I’d do.”

It shouldn’t come as a surprise. Varric, Hawke, and the rest have given Anders so much of themselves. So much support, so much acceptance. Yet the look in his eyes when he looks back at Varric is quiet astonishment and gratitude. “Thank you. Just don’t get the Templar involved in this. I don’t want to listen to him try and justify this.” With that, Anders slides into a chair, stretching out his wounded leg and gathering his magic again.

 

Fenris lets his sight wander from Anders only long enough for Varric to walk out the door. Perhaps more pointedly, for the deep click of a lock behind him. Only then does he even begin to relax, if just a little, his shoulders pulling downward as his gaze sweeps back to the mess of blonde hair sitting at his side. “What do you think they were doing, if they let you go?” The elf’s voice is quieter, now, solemn but taking what few moments of calm that he can to think.

“I don’t know. I truly don’t. I wasn’t followed. All this raid will accomplish is to make it impossible for me to open the clinic again. Maybe that’s what they want? Typically Templar, no good deed left unpunished.” The wound on Anders’ thigh closes, leaving the bloodstained rent in his clothing. He takes a roll of bandages from his pack and wraps his leg, just to conceal the bloody tear. When he’s done, he raises his face, and the worry in his tone is written plainly there. “Or it could just be that Meredith doesn’t want a political confrontation with Hawke. Funny, this business of having friends in high places. If even the Knight Commander thinks Hawke would raise a stink over me, who am I to say otherwise.”

“Maybe.” The word doesn’t sound convinced in itself and Fenris shifts uneasily on his heels, glancing towards to closed door. Imagining Meredith barging in just for saying her name, or just that wariness he’s had since he arrived in this city. Then, a quieter grumble, “I don’t like it. Not even Hawke influences her choices anymore, and I wouldn’t want to be the one returning empty handed.”

For once, Anders seems to share that wariness. He rises from the chair and picks another, further back in the room. He never quite turns his back on the door. “Maybe Aveline’s heard more. There’s nothing to do now but wait.” A sour look betrays how little he likes that. “Maker, how am I supposed to do that without going mad? Just sit tight while the Templars put innocents to the sword.”

Fenris watches Anders distance himself but doesn’t follow, far too comfortable posted between the door and the mage. The sharp, hawk like gaze in his eye, the arms rising to cross at his chest, and he might really be standing there to keep Anders in as much as Templars out. “As opposed to dying with them?” The elf goes silent with a snap of his head towards the door but he doesn’t reach for his sword, instead crosses the small space to unlock the door. “Perhaps they expected as much, would have been easier than hunting you down.”

The crisp knock comes after Fenris has aimed his glare at the door, and immediately Anders is half out of his seat, fear settling on him like a tightness across the shoulderblades. Varric wouldn’t need to knock on his own door, clearly. The door swings open when the latch is drawn back, and Sebastian is standing there, sober expression on his smooth, fine-featured face. He nods to Fenris as he enters, but doesn’t wait for the elf or the mage to give him leave to do so. He shuts the door behind him, leaving it up to Fenris to bolt it or not.  
“Anders.” The prince of Starkhaven is not at all surprised to find the mage here, and he looks at him with a level stare.  
“I see you think you have business with me. You don’t. Shove off.” Anders spits his words out, rising to his feet to be eye to eye with the archer.  
“I’m here as your comrade in arms, Anders. Hear me out. You’ve a difficult choice ahead of you and it’s not one a man should have to make alone.”

Fenris locks the door, reluctantly when it means Sebastian will stay that much longer, and crosses his arms over his chest again as soon as he can. “He isn’t alone. You just want him to hear your opinion.” But he pauses after that; as much as putting the prince and the mage in the same room stirs trouble, he wouldn’t blame Sebastian’s stance were he in some other position than Anders’ bed.  
The man hardly falters at Fenris’ harsh words, barely half-turns to him, words patiently calm. “No, I think he should hear everyone’s opinion. That /includes/ mine, Fenris.”

“I don’t need opinions, I need -help-!” Anders clenches his hands into fists at his sides. “And if you’re offering I welcome it. If not, just… stay out of it. This doesn’t involve you.”  
“It involves me as much as it does Hawke, and I saw Varric on his way to Hightown. All I want is to stop any needless bloodshed. The Templars are only following their orders, Anders. They’re people, just as much as those they arrested. You even know some of them. Keran, Ruvena, Thrask–”  
“/Needless/ bloodshed? The Templars are going to execute innocent people, I don’t think standing up to them is needless in the least!”  
“They’re not innocent, Anders. Harboring an Apostate is a crime, just punished more strictly here than in other cities.”  
“They’ll be hanged! The people who’ve kept me fed and clothed, whose sicknesses I’ve healed, whose babies I’ve delivered… This is not a sacrifice I ever asked them to make!”  
“But you let them make it, all the same.”

“/Enough./” For all the times Fenris has been silent, even his recent outbursts cooled to a violent grumbling, when he raises his voice the sound is loud and firm. Sebastian goes silent, and the elf waits to be sure neither will say another word before he continues, though his eyes level squarely on the prince. “As I understand it, you don’t intend to aid us. We’ve heard you, and what’s done is done. Is your intention keep berating him, or do you have a proposal for what we do about it?”

Sebastian keeps his cool, but the look he gives Fenris is a bit curious, a bit quietly scrutinizing, as if he’s jotting down a mental note that the elf has begun taking leave of his senses. “I think the answer is staring you both in the face. Anders needs to go to the Gallows. That’s the only way this can end. If he pleads for mercy and surrenders in a show of good faith, I’m sure Meredith will see reason. ”  
“She’ll see me given the brand, that’s what she’ll see.” Anders’ voice is subdued, his face gone white. “And she’ll call it ‘mercy’ just like you are.”  
“I did tell you you’ve a hard choice to make. Sometimes the right thing isn’t easy.”

“That may have been an option before the Templars took the clinic.” The usual glare Fenris spares no one from save Hawke has darkened, taken on a far more dangerous note. “But it isn’t now. If he does what you’re demanding, nothing stops Meredith from hanging them all anyway. It would still be in accordance to the law. What would that accomplish?”

“Righteousness is an end in itself,” Sebastian says earnestly. "If he goes, at least it proves to these people what their sacrifices meant to him. At least it proves he won’t abandon the people who’ve given him safe harbor.“ He addresses Fenris now. Anders stands with his head bowed, whatever case Sebastian came to plead already decided in his mind. "He’ll be missed, but it’s an honorable way to end this. Surely you can see that no mage can hold himself above the law. It’s -time-, Anders. Time to return to the circle and put an end to this.”  
The words are barely out of Sebastian’s mouth when the mage shoves him aside with one hand to the chest, head down and almost running for the door.

The hand that lashes out to catch Anders by the arm is harsh, palm thudding and fingers snapping closed to a painfully tight grip, and thankfully there’s no clawed gauntlet to anchor on the way Fenris wants to. His eyes had fallen to the aged planks along the floor, but when Anders tries to pass by him, when the words leave the prince’s mouth, he looks back up, his own decision made. “This is no longer the law they’re upholding, Sebastian. I suggest you leave.”

Sebastian bobs his head, calm and gracious as always, his manner carrying an implied “all you had to do was ask” regardless of the fact that he’s been unwelcome from the moment he walked through the door. But as he turns to leave, a key turns in the latch, the door opening to reveal several figures standing in the corridor, Varric at the fore.  
“Choirboy, looks like you’re on your way out.” Varric says it mildly, but the words carry the force of a polite demand. Varric and the others with him – Hawke, Isabela, Aveline – stand aside as Sebastian sweeps through the door.  
Anders’ arm aches where Fenris holds it, but the pain is like a rope to anchor him, something precious to hold onto. He sinks into the chair beside Fenris without a word , slouched not as a man defeated but someone holding his body curled against a rain of blows.

The sharp glare follows Sebastian’s back and the death grip remains even as Anders sits, quietly desperate and that the mage will be gone the moment he lets go. It hardly lets up when the others file in, and he doesn’t sit down.  
Isabela casts a glance to Fenris, one of the only ones to outright meet that intensity Sebastian has stirred him up to, and doesn’t look away until his eyes soften, if only the littlest bit.  
It’s Aveline that breaks the small awkward silence once the prince is gone, clearing her throat. The way Isabela looks away, then, and the elf knows they were already thinking what only Aveline can put on the table. She doesn’t start until Hawke locks the door behind them again, with a curt nod of approval from Varric.  
“I’m /sorry/, Anders. There isn’t much even I can do once they’re in the gallows.”

“This… this is my fault.” Anders shakes his head. “All I did was run… all I’m good for.”  
Varric’s broad hand comes down on Anders’ shoulder, fingers threading through the feathers on his pauldrons. “Don’t say that, Blondie. Don’t even think it.”  
A few more moments pass in silence. Hawke stands with Isabela at his side, his fingers interwoven with hers and squeezing her smaller hand. When Anders speaks again his voice is rough and low and sad. “Then… I’m sorry to have troubled you all.”

Isabela finally pipes up, at that. “If you were troubling us I wouldn’t have bothered putting on my clothes.”  
Hawke chokes back an embarrassed cough at that, raises an eyebrow as he casts a glance to her from the corner of his eye. Of all of them- Aveline’s armored hands planting to the table, Varric sitting to his usual chair with a troubled look, Isabela uncharacteristically quiet, Fenris the unspoken guard every bit as intimidating as he must have been at a magister’s side- Hawke stands tall and shoulders squared, looking halfway like he’s debating whether or not to storm the gallows. “Whatever happens, we need you to be somewhere safe for the night. It won’t do much good if they protected you only for the Templars to drag you in later.”  
Varric nods, propping an elbow along an arm of his chair. “The Hanged Man can keep quiet about anything, but she’s no fortress. Once they’re done with darktown they’d come here.”  
Aveline sighs, with a small shrug. “As secure as the holding cells are, I doubt he wants them.”  
“Well that settles it then.” Isabela has a somber but hopeful smile, any attempt to crack into Anders’ misery. “This isn’t what I had in mind when I dreamed about you boys sleeping over, but we have space.”

Anders raises his head. “Now that would be something,” he says with a smirk, undressing Isabela with his eyes, even as tired as they are. But as the others decide where he’ll be spending the night, what the next few hours will bring, he breathes out a heavy and defeated sigh. Without a thought, he leans his head against Fenris’s arm. “What -did- you have in mind? I’d hate to turn it down without a good, lurid proposition. I’m sure I don’t have the energy but there’s always tomorrow, if you can get Fenris to go along.”

With a catch for at least a little distraction, if shallow, Isabela tsks and tips her head. “No details tonight. Not when he’s latched onto you like you’re made of thin air, at least.”   
When she mentions it Fenris does immediately let go, as if he’d entirely forgotten what he’d been doing, used to the pressure and only now realizing that it might leave bruises if left untended. Even still the movement is halting, a jerk of fingers and awkward but violently reluctant pull down, a struggle of will that Anders won’t run away the first chance he gets.  
Hawke doesn’t notice, or pretends not to at least. “There’s a space overlooking the fireplace with windows you could make an escape out of, if it comes to it. Not exactly home, but Fenris had corpses before you moved in. The smell /has/ to be better.”

Anders rises to his feet, slow and weary. "The smell was never that bad, actually. All the holes in the roof kept it pretty aired out.“ He half-turns to Fenris when the other lets go of his arm, wanting to ask him not to let go. He can feel the fresh ache of blood rushing back to suffocated muscle. When he finally raises his head, there’s a lost look in his eyes, a moment of hesitation as he seems almost disoriented. He tries to shake the feeling off. "I feel like a kite with a cut string. I… Let’s just go, then.”

Fenris simply nods, small and curt little motion, then traces his eyes up to Hawke and Isabela. They both turn to file out and lead the way, as Varric sinks back into his chair. Aveline follows behind them, but at the door catches Anders’ shoulder, her touch so much more gentle and barely felt through the pauldron. The movement stops Fenris and he turns to look back, the other two following suit. “I.. frankly, I don’t think I can do anything. But Meredith will likely leave it until morning. I’ll be trying until then. Donnic will stop by during his rounds to tell you either way.”   
And with that she brushes down the feathers she ruffled out of place with a small, awkward pat, and turns to leave down the hall, pace quick and determined.

“Aveline! I owe you for this.” Anders calls after the guard captain and the retreating clinking of her armor. In his head he tallies piles of similar debts, wondering how he keeps accumulating more when each time he tells himself he’ll make good. Somehow.


	47. Chapter 47

As it turns out, perhaps predictably considering who it is and the miracles he makes seem easy, Hawke does pretty well for accommodating two men when there’s no empty beds.  
Well, save one, but nobody offers or asks about it.  
Isabela certainly offers /their/ bed, but it’s a small joke for now. It can be a true offer later.  
The place Hawke does give is a small nook, on the second floor and overlooking the fireplace, with tall windows nearby open for the spring air. The night breezes are still a bit crisp, but he and Isabela drag out several thick furs to pad the floor and another blanket to cover it all. With, unfortunately, no extra pillows. Still, Isabela props her wrists to her hips with a smile. “It’s enough of a nest for the night, anyway.”  
Fenris’ thanks had been quiet but earnest as they left. With barely a word more he pulls his sword from his back, and sets it carefully to the floor as he sits down on the makeshift bed.

Anders has been lost in his thoughts, though whenever someone has addressed him directly he’s emerged enough to answer with a sad smile or a shake of the head. He’s been grateful, when he’s been present enough to convey it. But in most moments he’s seemed closed in upon himself, shying away from the world almost demurely, almost as though he considers his mere presence to be a terrible imposition.  
He’s set his staff out of the way, his coat draped over it, and when Fenris sits down on their nest of furs, he lowers himself to his hands and knees, and then simply flops onto his side listlessly, gaze distant and hollow.

Fenris’ hands pause over his chest, fingering at the tedious clasps as he looks over his shoulder. For almost too long he simply watches, unable to find the words appropriate to say and then debating if it would even be right to say anything at all. Nothing much could bring comfort, not properly. In the end he turns his attention back down to the clasps and, lamely, he settles for “Do you intend to sleep like that?”

“Does it matter?” Anders blinks, twice, coming back to himself at the sound of Fenris’s voice. A moment later his brown eyes focus on the curve of the elf’s spine, on his tousled silver hair and the tips of his ears peaking out beneath it. Fenris is here, with him. He makes an attempt at thinking of what would happen if the Templars came for them, what would happen if Fenris made the same sacrifice his helpers had, but he can’t picture it. He can only see Fenris fighting the Templars with him, side by side. And he sees Fenris winning.  
“You keep me so damnably safe.”

He stops again but this time because the vest can be shrugged off to the floor, and with a bit of effort Fenris slinks under the cover amongst the pile of hides. The pants stay on, but that’s likely a good idea when the elf could be jumping out the window onto neighboring rooftops at any moment. “Why? Because I kept you from throwing yourself to Meredith at Sebastian’s suggestion?” As if he’d forgotten it until now Fenris shifts closer to Anders’ back and frees his arms to curl around the mage’s waist whether he intended to get up or not, forehead planting squarely between two shoulderblades.

“No. Because I know you can fight your way out of more trouble I’m ever likely to bring down on you.” Anders’ body curls, his back pressing up against Fenris’s chest, his breath leaving him in a deep sigh. “At least I hope to the maker that’s true, or I’m being a selfish coward even now.”

“It wouldn’t be the first time I’d risk my life for a mage. I just assumed it would be my last.” Fenris tightens his grip, just enough to make them snug against each other, and he nuzzles into Anders’ back as he gets comfortable.Then adds, a small grumble of an afterthought, “You’re just doing what they wanted.”

“That doesn’t make it right.” Anders lines his forearms up with Fenris’s where they wrap around his trunk, rests his hands on Fenris’s clasped hands. "They’re still going to die and it’s still my fault. I’m still the one laying here, doing nothing, benefiting from a sacrifice no one should have to make.“

“What do you suggest you do, exactly? Ask the gallows nicely?” The sound is still a grumble from Fenris’ throat, muffled further from how he’s pressed himself to Anders’ back. It would be a wonder the mage could understand him at all, if they weren’t so close. “You aren’t doing nothing. You’re hiding.”

”/Fight/.“ Anders makes a frustrated noise in his throat and tries to bury his face in the furs. "Haven’t you always been one to tell me not to run, to stand my ground, to face the consequences of my actions?”

“I’m not telling you to flee the city, or worse, nothing. I’m telling you that killing yourself is pointless if you want to accomplish anything.” Fenris trails off, with his own exasperated sigh, but more at himself and how equally pointless he feels his words are. “Doesn’t your demon have any sense of the matter?”

Anders is still for a moment, reining his temper in, venturing cautiously inward for a glimpse of Justice but finding the same heedless rage and anguish he’d had to shut out in the alleyway lest it take him over. He shifts, loosening Fenris’s arms around him, but only so he can roll to his other side and put his arms around his lover. "My ‘demon’ is incoherent right now.“ He sounds stricken, his voice half strangled with worry. He buries his face against the crook of Fenris’s neck. "I almost lost myself to him once over this already. It isn’t his fault, our anger, it’s just…”

Fenris lets his arms loosen, and as Anders settles once more he drapes back across the man’s shoulders, no pull and just blanketing, does the same with his head as he lets his cheek rest on cheek. The elf’s breathing is slow and steady, voice quieting and warm air brushing at Anders’ ear with his words. “It’s just what?”

“It’s heedless, it’s terrifying, but it’s… righteous. What is happening here, what has been happening across Thedas to mages and their families… it can’t be allowed to continue. We can’t go on thinking that if we keep our heads down this prejudice and violence will just pass us by, as if it’s somehow alright when someone else gets taken to the Gallows or the headsman’s block or taken and branded. As long as it happens at -all- we -all- suffer for it.”

With that Fenris pulls away, lifts his arm and his cheek to carefully disengage from his partner. He rolls onto his stomach, still close enough to Anders for them to be flush against each other, propped up by his elbows as he stares down at the furs and his hands. 

Anders sighs as Fenris turns away. He wonders if he should have held his tongue, but worrying about his lover’s sensibilities when friends are dying seems like an especially shortsighted kind of mistake. And a pointless one. He cuddles up against Fenris, this time, an arm and leg draped over him, his weight resting on the slighter but no less solid form beneath him. “We knew we couldn’t keep what we found forever. This patch of sunlight, this taste of contentment. If anything, seeing how right it could be with you only made all the wrongs in this world seem so much more unforgivable. I know what they’re poisoning, now. What life was meant to be.”

“/Stop/… stop.” Fenris drops his head, shoulders slumping with the weight. It takes a few long, pregnant moments of silence before he draws his mind back together enough for words. Even still, with his head down, his eyes look towards the far wall, avoiding Anders’ gaze. “When I was still content with taking orders, several groups of slaves decided to plan a revolt. They sounded like you do. I thought.. I thought if I could leave, with no more slavers after me and Danarius dead, I could try to be happy.” He huffs, a silent humorless laugh. “I was a fool. None of it ever changes.”

Anders falls silent. Fenris’s words, the bitter hurt in his voice, remind him of why he ran when the others gave him the chance. He had to come back to Fenris. And even now, as he weighs them in his mind, he doesn’t know which is more important – justice for the mages, for the world… or justice for Fenris. Even with Danarius dead and his enslavement over, there’s still so much to set to rights. He lifts one hand, brushing silver hair back from Fenris’s brow while he watches his eyes. “What do you need, to be happy?”

When Fenris shifts a glance back towards Anders the look is grim but as fiercely, intensely determined as ever. “If you want to fight the Templars.. then I will always be at your side for it. What I need.. what I /want/, is for you to live.”

That intensity reaches Anders, through so many layers of guilt, anguish, and loss. His brown eyes widen. Fenris’s words, the feeling behind them, sink in, and his chest feels so full his breathing turns shallow. “I want to live beside you. With you or not at all.”

Fenris’s eyes trail back down, then his elbows follow suit, drawing forward then crossing for his chin to prop along his wrists. Then he leans, so casually these days, closer towards Anders’ body though he doesn’t look up again. Only forward, past the wood banisters to the lively fireplace in the livingroom below. “They didn’t.”

“Who didn’t what?” Anders rests his chin against Fenris’s hair, his arms giving the elf a gentle, lingering squeeze.

“Live. The revolt in Tevinter. None of them survived. Save the mages. They were given a slap on the wrist, because the idea was ridiculous enough that it wasn’t worth punishing them by example.”

“This isn’t Tevinter. But… imagine. If every slave in the Imperium took up arms against their masters… would it be so ridiculous then?”

The grumble that comes from Fenris remains void of aggression, dulled with somber notes of having lived through the ordeal. “I’d rather not picture it. It was no small number then, and they were still stamped out. The Imperium would win.”

“Andraste fought them once, and took the south from them. It might not be so hopeless, even if others have tried and failed. If no one tries, then it’s certain that nothing will change.” Anders smooths one palm along the firm contours of Fenris’s shoulderblades. “This is a terrible regret of yours,” he observes.

Perhaps more than he knows. “Andraste fought them a long time ago.” While he rolls his shoulders up towards the touch his head drops, cheekbone to wrists and that mess of white hair with the end points of ears towards Anders. “I mostly regret that I seem to have found the one mage interested in doing the same. At least you have your magic, they were nothing but whores, shoemakers and cooks.”

“Did you fight them?” Anders’ voice is a soft thrum near one of those ears, warm breath skimming across it. He can’t help but wonder if Fenris had any kind of active role in the end of this doomed revolt.

“I wouldn’t call it fighting.” Fenris sighs, and even laying down his shoulders fall noticeably, along with his voice, to something frustrated. “A few of them, when they threatened Danarius. He didn’t even need to order me.”

“I’m sorry,” Anders says, but it sounds more as if he’s offering condolences than an apology. "We can speak of something else, if you’d rather.“ He shifts closer, more of his weight resting across Fenris’s back. On an idle whim he closes his lips over the tip of Fenris’s ear.

Fenris begins to move to turn towards the mage but stops, consciously, before that kiss can part from his skin. A touch far more welcome than the last time Anders nipped him a bit too hard, somewhat unexpectedly so, and some of the elf’s tension eases. “I would just rather you keep it in mind.” 

Anders tries to frame a promise but it sticks on his tongue. Instead, lips pursed against the upper edge of Fenris’s ear, he slides kisses along its length. "I love you, you know.” That much he knows is true. That much he can promise.

“I would hope so, from how far you’ve led me from my bed tonight.” But a definite humor tones Fenris’ grumble, and he inches his chin to one side to at least watch Anders from the corner of his eyes. “I will be at your side for this. As long as I still live, you will too.”

“That’s a dirty elf trick. I’ll have to regard my own life as highly as if it was yours. I’m onto your scheme.” Anders’ tone is affectionately droll. He closes his teeth on the edge of Fenris’s ear, but it’s only a small, light nip. Then he nuzzles his face into the soft hair at the nape of his neck and sighs against his skin.


	48. Chapter 48

Anders stands at the mouth of the cavern with his head bowed. The sky outside is grey and the wind whistles past the cavern entrance. The light is dim but Anders can still see where the blood spilt last night – he assumes last night – stains the mud a darker color. The corpses have been left for animals and rot to take. Here and there, a pile of ash, a puddle of the strange oily remnants of a summoned shade. Scorch marks on the walls, ice on the ceiling, but not much. The Templars clearly took control of the fight quickly. As Anders moves further into the cavern he sees what must have been the final outcome. The bodies are piled with their heads nearby, and a blood-soaked log must have served as the chopping block. The dead men and women have bound wrists and bloated hands. They surrendered. They were executed.  
The healer is silent, his face blank as a stone wall. He walks back to the entrance of the cave without a glance upward, and he begins to account for the dead. He turns fallen bodies on their backs to look them in the face. He closes their staring eyes. His lips move to frame the names, but he doesn’t voice them. He pauses to count on his fingers now and then, ticking off a mental list without a single word spoken. Finally he comes to the heads. He looks them in the face, one by one, and sets them aside.  
Mistress Selby’s severed head is at the bottom of the pile. Making her, Anders figures, first to go to the block. "Well, then,“ he says. "Found her. Right where I knew she’d be.” The mage sits on his heels, staring at the back wall of the cave.

 

The stench is something that hits Fenris before they even enter the cave. Inside, given the night and enough of the day for the stone to warm up with a stale humid breeze, the smell is thick and sticks to everything. Death, bile, and rotting meat.  
It was one thing to kill people, and another to hang around while their juices festered enough to taste it on the air.  
But the elf stays, silent while he keeps an eye to their surroundings and less the bodies Anders passes over. Uneasy, so clearly so, his shoulders squared back at his sides and spine stiff. He manages to wait until Anders finally speaks. “We should go, before someone else decides to come down here.”

“Wait for me outside,” Anders says. His voice is calm, maybe even flatly calm, and distant. He places Mistress Selby’s head with the others and rises to his feet. "There’s something I need to do. I won’t be long.“

Fenris doesn’t immediately reply, eyes flickering between the mage and the remains beside him. When he does his words are careful, and somewhat forced from his chest. "No. Do what you intend to. I’ve stayed at your side for too long to turn away now.”

Anders turns, and his eyes focus on Fenris’s face. It takes only a moment but it’s as if his thoughts come back from some far-off place, as if everything in his mind needs to shift out of place so tenderness can make its way forward again. He smiles, sad, awkward, and leans his forehead against Fenris’s. “I will, I just need you to wait outside…” He holds one hand away from them both, fire gathering in his palm, and he gestures with it to the bodies stacked like cordwood in the back of the cave.

Fenris snarls, nose scrunched and lip curled, either from the smell settling into the pit of his stomach or sheer frustration at himself and so many things. He doesn’t offer any explanation, nor does he lash out as much as he wants to. Instead his chin tips to kiss Anders, lips pursing closed over his teeth for just a moment before he turns away to leave. “Don’t do anything stupid.”

Anders swallows the knot in his throat while he watches Fenris turn away. He waits until he can no longer see the elf’s silhouette against the grey sky outside before he gathers his magic in earnest. His thoughts turn to fire. He pulls heat from the stone walls of the cave, up from deep in the ground, from the bodies themselves, from his anguish, from his fury, and his spell washes over the corpses, reflecting forward, licking the wet stones all around him. Heat blasts from the mouth of the cave as everything within is consumed. Everything but Anders, who emerges singed but whole, his coat dusted with dark ash. He stands at the cave mouth with the fire at his back. Then, head and shoulders slumped, he makes for the path that leads back down the mountain. “That’s all there is to it,” he says, waiting for Fenris to fall into step beside him.

He does, with a strong huff of air from his lungs in a last ditch attempt to leave the smell of death behind him. “Is it. They’re going to know another mage was here, Anders. Are there any others left?”

“No.” Anders answers, curtly at first. “That was all of them. The last of them still in Kirkwall. Now they’re dead. The mages, and everyone helping them. The Templars didn’t even take prisoners.” He looks back over his shoulder at Fenris. “This is why they raided the clinic. To keep me from hearing about this, to keep me out of this fight. They got everything they wanted. The Mage Underground is finished and they didn’t even have to get on Hawke’s shitlist to do it.” Even though his voice stays even, his face tightens and twists. A tear rolls down his cheek even while his expression turns perplexed, as if he’s not sure why it’s there. “See? Just the way I said it would happen…”

“Listen to me.” Fenris’ voice is firm and even, his gaze sharpened with something dangerous deep inside him. But it’s not for Anders, or the mages. “Mourn them later. If there aren’t any others then the Templars know you’re still in the city. I wouldn’t count on Hawke’s name meaning anything if they decide to finish this.”

The hard edge in Fenris’s voice shores up Anders’ resolve. He blinks away the tear and he nods. "I’m sure they will, sooner or later. Probably sooner, now. If they catch me, I won’t be caught unprepared.“

"I would rather them not catch you in the first place.” Fenris lightly claps a hand to Anders’ shoulder, to turn them both and coax the mage to keep walking. “We need to find a change of clothes for you, or else they won’t even have to assume it was you in that cavern.”

“Alright. I have a little coin,” Anders says, patting the pouch at his belt. “The trick is getting into the city, with the tunnels closed off.” The mage seems content to follow Fenris’s lead, though still distant somehow. Most likely to keep grief from catching up with him. It’s only after a moment that he realizes why his clothes are suspect, and starts to try and brush the ash from his feathered pauldrons. He looks around, the mountain path seeming suddenly unfamiliar even though he’s traveled it with Hawke many times. For a moment he looks to Fenris, lips parted as if to ask him where they are and why, before he shakes his head and lengthens his strides.

“I suppose there’s always swimming into the port…” The tone is grumbling, a joke he’d rather not have come true and the both of them dragging up like a pair of drowned rats onto the docks. But Fenris pauses, his words and not his steps, eyes narrowing as he watches Anders. “What is it?”

“It’s nothing, I… I feel scattered. Like last night. Lost.” Anders shakes his head again as he speaks. “Every time I try to focus I get afraid I’ll fall apart on you. Not that I’m much more use to you like this, I need to… Wall, walls, how do we– Fenris, have you ever been able to pass through stone? You could get into the city anywhere along the walls that way.”

This time Fenris does stop, and hardly pauses before answering. “You make it sound easy. I wouldn’t want to, and that still doesn’t solve your problem. I couldn’t take you with me even if I could do it. Why?”

“I don’t know. You could get help from Varric, or Aveline, figure out how to get me in past the guards. I can’t… I can’t figure out anything better, right now.”

Fenris pauses, eyes glancing down in thought. “Could you make a diversion inside the walls? There shouldn’t be many guards at the southern gate at this hour.”

“I… I think so. As long as I can see where I’m placing the spell.” Anders chews his lower lip for a moment while he thinks. “You know, if it’s my clothes that are the problem I can always leave my coat under a bush and come back for it later.” He starts releasing the large buckles that fasten the front of his coat, and unwrapping the belt around his waist. The roughspun tunic he wears underneath is relatively clean, even if the fabric’s worn thin enough that the silhouette of Anders’ body is faintly visible through it whenever there’s light at his back.

“…and your staff? If you leave it we won’t need a diversion. Aveline can fetch it later.”

Anders nods. “I’ll stash it with my coat. Any distraction I can conjure will be obvious magic once anyone stops to think about it. This way will be better.” He shrugs his coat off, and fastens his belt around his waist again, the only thing that gives his tunic any semblance of shape. The air is crisp enough that the hairs on his arms stand up, goosebumps raised on his skin. He pulls the leather thong loose that ties his hair up as well, and ends up looking much like any lowtown laborer or dock worker in Kirkwall.

Fenris glances over Anders for a moment, crosses his arms. They don’t exactly have anything else to work with. “A pity we can’t leave you out here a few months for that beard to grow. Good enough. You go in first. If there’s a problem, it won’t be a mage that killed them.”

Anders steps off the path, hiding his coat and his staff under shrubs and leaf-litter, then returning. He gives Fenris a worried look. “You’re not really planning to kill city guards over me, are you? It’s… not going to come to that, is it?”

Fenris glances away, then on down the dirt road to the city walls, anywhere that’s pointedly away from Anders’ eyes. “Try not to get noticed. I doubt Aveline and Donnic would still consider me a friend.”

“Fenris.” Anders reaches for his lover’s hands. “You don’t have to. I can run, I can hide. You don’t have to put yourself through this.”

“Where? Until when?” Fenris steps away to flinch back from Anders’ reach but only makes it halfway, one hand loosely caught under that touch he has no will to fight against. “Your only other plan was to risk me walking through stone walls. I would much rather this.”

Anders lets his hand drop away from that touch. He draws back, standing as straight as he can manage. It seems useless to state what’s obvious now, how he’s brought this down on his lover’s head, how he knew this day would come and he stayed anyway. “You’re right,” he says, coughing to clear his throat when his voice turns rough. “Let’s go.”


	49. Chapter 49

Hawke had been the first one in, and the first one out of the sewers. It was the second time Fenris had let Anders out of his sight, though on some level he trusted Hawke more than himself to keep an eye on the mage’s safety.  
The smell is why the elf had elected to guard the entrance to the sewers instead of follow them in. Or rather, it was a fair excuse. If Fenris had really been so determined, he had a strip of cloth in a pack he could have shielded his senses with. What he’d really wanted was some time alone. Truly alone, and not the ‘alone’ he was becoming accustomed to. Time to think; about the Templars, the city, Tevinter.. and a certain blonde mage who didn’t seem to be anyone Fenris was familiar with lately. At first he’d blamed Justice, but after some thought it didn’t seem right. Even less so, when Anders had convinced Hawke and Isabela to go down to the sewers with him on this fool’s mission.  
As the man hauls himself up the stairs out of the foggy air of the sewers, a quick nod to Fenris as he does, he passes a small bag back to Anders, Isabela following behind them. “I was a bit skeptical at first, but perhaps you can chase off Justice by smell alone.”

Anders actually smiles at that and gives voice to a small, bright laugh. "If it was that simple he’d have been gone the first time we went by the fisheries. Thank you, Hawke. Thinking I can finally… resolve this, it’s almost too much to believe.“ His gaze flickers over to Fenris for a moment, but then away again, almost shy, almost… guilty.

Hawke nods, with a wave of his hand as soon as it’s free from the pouch he’s all too eager to be rid of. “As long as you think it would help. If you need anything else-”  
Isabela coughs as she claps a hand over Hawke’s shoulder and echoes a smile to Anders. “If he needs anything else I think he can wait a moment, I need something to wash this smell out. To the Hanged Man? I’m sure they won’t notice a bit more muck for all the piss.”

"I’ll let you know, but not until after we’ve all had time for a hot bath.” Anders’s tone is steady and reassuring, even though his good-humored smile barely touches his eyes. He takes the bag from Hawke and breaks away from the group, head lowering as he approaches Fenris. "Hawke and Isabela are heading for the Hanged Man. I’m sure you’d be welcome to join them.“

Fenris turns with a single parting glance towards Isabela, and instead falls easily into step with Anders. “I’d rather have a word with you regarding this.. ‘idea’.”

"As you wish.” Anders says it so readily he can only have been expecting this. He directs their path along one of the more roundabout routes back to hightown. "We can talk back at the mansion. With the clinic gone I’ve got nowhere else to work.“

“Fine.” But Fenris doesn’t really sound fine about waiting to discuss things weighing on his mind, nor does he actually wait, and once they’re remotely alone with only a few passers by he begins again. “Do you even have a point to this? /Either/ of you?”

Anders keeps his head down while they walk. He’s still wearing his hair loose, and while he wears part of his coat, he’s taken to leaving the feathers off and letting the coat hang open over his belted tunic. He scoffs mildly at Fenris’s question, but he doesn’t look up. "You think I’d do this on a whim? That I’m just looking for an excuse to go digging through filth in the sewers? I will admit, if being elbows deep in shit was my idea of a good time this would have been the -best day ever.- But no, not so much, Fenris.”

Fenris hardly falters, though from his glare forwards Meredith herself may as well be standing on up their path, voice sharp through his teeth. “You’re a fool if you think I’ll believe what you’ve told the others. You wouldn’t cast him out without his consent. Or without you both intending something. Answer the question.”

“I’m doing what he wants,” Anders says. His tone is level, even though the corners of his mouth twist bitterly. "After what we’ve seen he thinks he has no place in this world. So I’m setting him loose… hoping he can find his way home.“

“And he would do that to you? /Now/?” The elf’s words are less accusingly skeptical, or less skeptical anyway, and less towards Anders. He catches the man’s shoulder as he stops, turns to face him, grip tight but not nearly as much as he has been in the past. “I never thought you would abandon him.”

Anders finally does pause, his head turning as his eyes show a flash of blue light. "When I joined with him I believed I had more to offer him than anguish and strife. I know otherwise now. He carries a burden of anger I cannot allay. I have only added to the weight he carries on his shoulders.” Justice looks away, his expression not somber so much as stony. "It is time to set it right.“

Fenris simply stares at those eyes, blankly, then gives Anders’ shoulder a small shove as he turns to keep walking. "You’re a fool if you think this is any better. You both are.”

“You could try being happy about it. You won’t have to worry about me turning into a tumorous mass of pure evil anymore, that must be a load off your mind.” Those words can only be Anders, laced with acerbic wit and a hint of condescension. "Maybe it isn’t any better but neither of us can see how it could be any worse, either. Why are you so upset about it?“

”/Shut up./“ Fenris’ response is quick, a warning snap that he isn’t in the mood. "If you were really so happy, you would be less cold these past nights. If you wanted to bed an oblivious idiot you should have found someone else.”

“I’m not happy about it. That doesn’t change what must be done.” The rebuke stings, and Anders does flinch. He lowers his head again, looking weary and troubled. The dark circles under his eyes, once so familiar, are back again, and hints of the hollow-cheeked leanness he once had are already threatening to return. “We know you’ll miss him. And he feels the same. But the world doesn’t pivot upon what we want. The last few days have made that truly… painfully clear.”

This time when Fenris turns back and lashes out again he’s less restrained, gauntleted hand to a tight fist as his forearm braces against Anders’ chest and shoves him to the nearest wall. The movement, the sound of shoulderblades to stone is enough to get the attention of a few people, and though none of them seem particularly important Fenris leans in with hot breath and half-snarling words. “I said /shut up/, m-” And still, despite his boiling rage and lowered voice, he bites back that word. “All that you’ve made clear is that you know /nothing/ about me or what I feel.”

This time, Anders obeys. He stares back at Fenris mutely, unable to keep the sorrow out of his eyes. He looks his lover in the face until he can’t bear it, and lets his gaze drop away, his head bow even further. His throat feels tight as he swallows the words he wishes he could say.

With no response coming Fenris’ breathing begins to slow again, and eventually his arm drops as he backs away a couple steps. When he looks away himself the motion is with an exhausted sigh, less shame for what he did and more wanting less distractions while he goes back to thinking. Because apparently there’s not much else he can do about the situation. “We should move on.”


	50. Chapter 50

Anders works into the night.  
He takes up residence not in his study but the manor’s kitchen, spreading his books and alchemical gear across the table and countertops. After hours of distillation, the smell from the sela petrae has finally died down somewhat, a process not helped by the fact that the windows are shut and the curtains drawn. In one beaker, refined sela petrae is crystallizing slowly, while in another glass flask a number of chemicals dissolve lumps of drakestone, Anders’ latest acquisition. When the alembics don’t require his immediate attention, Anders pours over his books or copies arcane sigils onto small paper scrolls.

Fenris tried to just get some sleep, rather used to the mage staying up late on occasion. This time felt different though, and while he dozed off with a book in his hands all too soon his eyes flicked back open with a small jerk.  
So with a harsh grumble to the cool air he tracked down the man, to find himself standing arms crossed in the doorway to the kitchen with nothing to say. What was there /to/ say after all, other than he didn’t like it. And that much was obvious.  
“Is there some reason this cannot wait until morning?”

“Because alchemy takes time.” Anders snaps off his reply with barely a glance up from his books. Then he seems to remember himself, because he pauses, his features flooding with consternation before he covers his face with ink stained hands. "No… forgive me, I had no right… I just want this finished.“

“Wanting it finished means nothing if Templars find you and you’re too tired to do anything about it.” Fenris sighs, the sound punctuating the sentence with his exasperation, and his shoulder sinks to the frame at his side. “And he expects you to do this immediately?”

The way Fenris slumps against the doorframe makes Anders feel the empty space between them. He leans against the table and grips its edge, head lowered and eyes squeezed shut. "No. I… I can’t stop to think. I’ll fall apart if I do. I’m not strong enough for this but I have to, anyway.”

Fenris doesn’t immediately reply to that, watches Anders’ expression with some somber thought. Eventually his shoulders sink, just a bare inch or so, and his chin turns to look past them back the way he came. Whatever had drawn him that way, perhaps debating his words or just leaving Anders to it, he comes to a conclusion and returns his gaze. “He isn’t only asking your strength.”

“What more, then? What more is he asking?” Anders’ voice rasps softly and his knuckles whiten, his grip on the table’s edge tight. Not being able to rush forward and pull Fenris into his arms is beginning to feel like torture.

“Mine.” Fenris finally turns away at that, not so much fleeing as a tired defeat back to the bedroom. “Good night, mage.”

Anders’ reply is barely above a whisper, his voice breaking against the words. "I’m sorry.“ His tongue almost recoils from the bitter irony that the worst is yet to come. It will be over soon, he tells himself, but he can hear Justice’s voice harmonizing with his own, soft and melancholy.


	51. Chapter 51

“The grand cleric cannot help you.”

The sun is low over Kirkwall and the wind is still, leaving an empty silence for Anders’ voice to strain to fill. The sound of the butt of his staff striking the paving stones reverberates off the angular walls of the Hightown plaza. And as the apostate mage strides forward, the Knight Commander and the First Enchanter turn to him.

“Explain yourself, mage!” Meredith advances on him, eyes narrowing with spite. It was the looks she always gave Anders when he had the temerity to speak up in her presence. Perhaps he earned it, since he rarely did speak to her unless his own patience had unraveled. He rarely had anything to say but to try and enumerate her wrongdoings, the Templar order’s wrongdoings. But other times he wondered if it was simply that she liked order, and liked herself to be at the top of that order, and despised him for being unwilling to simply play the part of a useful tool in the Champion’s hands. A useful, dangerous thing.

 

“I will not stand by and watch you treat all mages like criminals while those who would lead us bow to their Templar jailers.” Anders punctuates his words with another crack of the butt of his staff against the stones under their feet. 

Orsino, at least, has the grace to look stung for a moment. The grace to actually consider the truth thrown in front of him before he dismisses it, nostrils flaring in indignant rage. He lifts his chin, green eyes glaring up at Anders, but it’s a very sad substitute for the elven glower he’s grown accustomed to. “How dare you speak to–” 

Anders cuts him short. He dares a great deal more than to speak, and soon the First Enchanter will see that. Soon everyone will. “The Circle has failed us, Orsino! Even you should be able to see that!” Anders can feel the heady rush of power as Justice’s voice harmonizes with his own. Fissures of blue light chase each other across his skin and finally, finally, everything is certain. The time is now, the cause is just, and all that remains is what’s right before him, this one thing that must be done. This one act, so stark in its horrible necessity, this doom that welcomes him with a mother’s open arms.   
“The time has come to act. There can be no half-measures.” Anders turns away from Orsino, from Meredith, as that flare of certainty passes. 

Hawke is standing near enough to witness the bewildered anguish that passes over Anders’ features. "Anders. What have you done?“

"There can be no turning back.” He wishes it were not true. Anders realizes he cannot look his friend, his often-times protector, in the eyes. He realizes he may never again be able to. And even as his words are strong and his voice is steady, he bows his head, shoulders slumped under the burden of his own sins, past and future.

And then the city quakes.

The very foundations of Kirkwall hum and growl. The Templars that surround the square look to the shuddering ground beneath their feet. Anders doesn’t raise his head. He can feel the others staring at him, but he can’t add the horror they feel to that he already feels toward himself.

Behind him, a pillar of red light bursts through the Kirkwall chantry. Stone shatters, brazen statues fall. The sound is louder than a thunder crack, and the grey air is suddenly thick with ash and showers of falling sparks. But the Chantry is gone, destroyed utterly, along with everyone within. Broken stone gathers into a roiling core of chaos above the shattered foundations, and explodes outward in a ring that clears the city on all sides.

“There can be no peace.”

For a moment a solid grey wall billows outward from the explosion, and with a sharp shake of the ground it reaches them. The blast is immediately overwhelming, the cool clear night air at once choked with scalding heat and ashy dust. Thick clumps drift down in a blackened mockery of snow, lazy in their descent. The initial wave is thick but passes over them, blankets across the rest of the city, and while strong sea breezes cut through it the air is no easier to breathe.  
Sebastian crumples the moment he realizes what building is now gone, a low kick to the gut that sends him to his knees as people he knew just simply aren’t anymore. He cries out in surprised misery, rises as he begins to pray, but the others are only distantly aware of his actions, the thundering echoing in their ears.

The steady words begin to break Meredith and Orsino from their stunned stares upward. The ground underneath them still rumbles lowly, trembles as the entire mountain shifts on it’s ground and begins to settle once more. A deep and softening sound, of a city surviving and not of more to come. It strengthens the next outbursts towards Anders, only for Meredith’s firm voice to silence them all again.

“The Grand Cleric has been slain by magic, the Chantry destroyed.” She spins on her heel to face the gathered crowd and the Templars nearest her begin to shift in place uneasily, or take a few drawing steps to spread out. Her posture, her tone, they can all read what she intends. “As Knight Commander of Kirkwall, I hereby invoke the right of annulment. Every mage in the circle is to be executed, /immediately/.”

Hawke’s mind reels, trying to take it all in, the explosion, the mages now sentenced. Just as he begins to respond to Meredith’s announcement his eyes widen, shoulders freezing and stiff as he realizes. Something that makes him turn to face Anders, angry and shocked and perhaps worst of all, betrayed. “Is /that/ why you’ve needed us these past few days, Anders? For this?”

Sebastian takes a step forward, eyes wide and half possessed. “/You/? You were… part of this?” He takes another step, too close, close enough for Isabela to step into his path. “He didn’t tell us.”

“Elthina was a good woman, and he /murdered her/!” His voice lowers, determined and dark, enough that Isabela takes a step back. “I swear to you, I will /kill him/.”

Hawke hardly flinches from his place, Isabela close enough at his side that he can feel her there, as he stares Meredith down. “I won’t let you slaughter them.”

And Fenris seems most out of place of all of them. Not a part of the arguments, barely registering the others even exist, ash darkening his hair and packing underfoot as he watches the empty air of what had been a building, moments ago. Only Hawke’s words finally draw his eyes down, but even then they seem unsettling and neutral, distant.

“If you knew what I had planned you would have been honor-bound to stop me. I couldn’t let that happen.” Anders surprises himself. He lifts his head, he looks Hawke in the eyes. Even though guilt sinks like a stone in the pit of his stomach, he finds that he can carry it there. Even as the rumble of the explosion still echoes off the mountains beyond the city walls, that shock of certainty, that moment of truth, still resonates within him. He knows this was not right, but he knows that it was necessary. When Hawke returns his gaze with sadness in his eyes, he realizes the Champion understands. He may be the only one who ever will.

“Their blood is on your hands.”

“I know.”

Orsino and Meredith’s outcries and outrage, Sebastian’s fury and Aveline’s consternation fade to the fringes of his awareness for that moment; Hawke is the only one whose words still have meaning. But then Hawke is stepping in, still trying to arbitrate between the Templars and the mages, his voice rising with frustration. "It’s time to choose,“ Anders states before he moves away from the others. Satisfied that even though Hawke shoots him a glare, well aware he’s been forced into this, he’s been played by someone he trusted, that betrayal isn’t enough to change the choice he must make.

"I won’t let you slaughter innocent people,” Hawke snarls at Meredith.

“Then you will share their fate.” Meredith says it with steel in her voice. "When you come to the gallows, Champion, I will be ready for you.“ The Knight Commander and the First Enchanter glare daggers at each other as Meredith withdraws her forces from the plaza. Perhaps she hopes that Hawke will take the time she grants him to reconsider. But as she leaves, her glower brushes across Bethany’s face. The Champion’s sister has eyes so much like her brother’s, carrying the same vibrant strength and determination. Looking at the spark within them it is impossible to forget that the Champion has never walked away from a fight.

"We have to warn the others,” Bethany says, her hand alighting on her brother’s elbow. "Brother… thank you.“ She draws away then, but Hawke turns upon her and throws his arms around her. He pulls her into a crushing embrace and buries his face against her shoulder. He whispers into her ear, lips against her hair but words lost under the sounds of chaos rising in the streets. Their eyes glisten with unshed tears which they both quickly blink away, and then Bethany rushes to join Orsino and the other Circle mages as they find their own quick, clandestine route back to the gallows.

And that leaves Anders.

The renegade mage sits on an empty crate near the bottom of the steps. He leans forward, elbows on his knees, gazing out over the city, gazing at nothing but the empty space away from the others. Away from his friends and his lover, all people who he had now unforgivably wronged.

"There’s nothing you can say I haven’t already said to myself.” Anders finally speaks when he hears the quiet tread of Hawke’s booted feet behind him. "I took a spirit into my soul and changed myself forever to achieve this. This is the justice all mages have awaited.“

"So you start a massacre to /prove a point/?”

“I’m not proving a point. I’m changing a world. How can you not understand this?”

“But, Anders… the cost…” Hawke shakes his head.

“The Chantry, the Templars have even more blood on their hands than I do. This doesn’t make it right. But now there’s a chance, a chance for it to finally change, after a thousand years. The Chantry has used fear to bludgeon us into submission and done it with our blessing. No matter what we do, in instigation or in self-defense, it’s always the mages that are wrong and damned for it. They take up arms against us, they kill us, confine us, torture us, but for us to use magic to fight for a place in this world was unthinkable. And it -is- monstrous, -war- is monstrous. But now the mages can fight with a clear conscience because the guilt is mine, it’s -all- on me. And if I pay for that with my life… then I pay. Perhaps then Justice would at least be free.”

Hawke stares, expression blank. Perhaps he finally, truly understands, facing down the barrel of it, but the dawning in his eyes is distracted as Sebastian tries to shove him aside, mistaking the pause for hesitation. Sebastian turns, facing their leader with blue eyes blazing a cold fire.

“If it had been me instead of her in the chantry today, would it take you so long to choose?! I know he’s your friend Hawke, but if you don’t kill him I will.”

Any revelations in Hawke’s eyes stop as they focus on Sebastian’s words, brows furrowing and pressing together so tightly. “You won’t. Stand aside.”

“I only will if you do what needs to be done! He dies, or I am returning to Starkhaven. And I will bring such an army with me on my return that there’ll be nothing left of Kirkwall for these maleficarum to rule!”

“You will /stand aside/, because this I need to deal with.” It might be the sharp focus Hawke has had all these years, the same gaze that drew them all in one by one to follow where he led. It might be Sebastian believed in Hawke, the way they all did, that he would make the right decision in the end. Or it might be the heel of Hawke’s hand settling to the small misericorde at his side. Whatever the reason, with those words and a brief but tense silence Sebastian stands aside, and Hawke steps forward.

When a familiar hand rests on Aveline’s shoulder, she honestly expects it. Had expected it this entire time, Fenris at her side a weighty presence, a scorched boulder of debris nobody else noticed. She knows what she feels about this. What she wants Hawke to do. That she is the only one who can stop Fenris on his path now, as he passes her. Perhaps that is why his hand is there, posing a silent question, trusting her judgement, and in this final moment considering her a friend.  
She does nothing, because she knows she would do the same for Donnic.

Fenris separates himself from the crowd, nearly shoves past Sebastian as he unsheathes his sword with a screech of metal, and plants himself between Hawke and Anders. Hawke stops but doesn’t step back, the elf’s weapon drawn and held high from his arm towards the man, and everyone falls silent. Distant sounds from Kirkwall drift on the air, faint and screams and yelling and roaring fires, and for all the years of fighting together neither knows if the other intends to kill.

Sebastian is the one to break the silence. But to Fenris now, words calmer, lower, half pleading for the elf to see. “You cannot let this abomination walk free, Fenris. I understand this is hard, but he brought it upon himself. Let this be over.”

The gentle words are short lived. Fenris doesn’t move, doesn’t so much as glance as in Sebastian’s direction, and neither does Hawke. With a snarl of frustration Sebastian reaches back, swings his bow forward with elbow locked, straightened to level on the elf as he reaches again for an arrow.

It comes to a halt as Isabela steps forward to catch the shaft.

Sebastian half-turns, enraged again that everyone seems to be turning on him for something so obvious, something that must be done, something that should be done, but he freezes halfway as the woman’s cold blade chills his throat. Isabela looks up to Fenris with a smile, so smirking and cheerful, full of barely hidden melancholy. “We’ll take care of this mess. You’ll have enough people wanting to kill you without our help, so go on then.”

Fenris turns on his heel, a knee dropping under him, a twist of his palm to pull the sword through the air and thrust the pommel squarely to Anders’ chest.

Darkness swallows the chaos.


	52. Chapter 52

The long brushes of grass grow in clumps amongst the cracked dirt and rocks, deep green near the root and fading to a wispy tawny color to the tips, rustling enough to drown out the lazy waves on the shoreline a little ways down the hill. At least they’re comfortable, and hide people well. The air carries an odd mix of ocean salt and ash, the smell more confusing than choking. Several plumes of smoke billow out of Kirkwall but this small hill is well beyond the city’s borders and from this angle, only Hightown in view, the Wounded Coast is only a passive observer of the events there.  
Fenris remains perched on one of the smaller boulders nearby, sword propped along his knees as he draws a whetstone over an edge, eyes up and focused on the city in a distant sort of calm. The coastline seems quiet, oddly so, animals and even most bandits out here shrinking back farther from the destruction.

 

Anders lies on his back, cushioned by grass almost the same color as his hair. He’s wheezing, one hand resting over the place in the center of his chest where Fenris had slammed him with the butt of his sword. His magic swirls and eddies around the bruise. Feeling it this way is almost like seeing it – in some ways more than seeing it. It’s a huge, black lump reaching deep into his chest, almost to his heart, but his magic soothes it and shrinks it. He could erase it altogether if he weren’t aware of the need to ration his power. Finally the spasming muscle under his lungs starts to relax and find its rhythm again. With a groan of pain, Anders raises his arms up over his head to give his lungs more room.  
“You shouldn’t have done this.”

The sound of oiled stone gliding along metal falls silent as Fenris’ hand stops. His eyes trail down, watches Anders silently for a few short moments before replying evenly, “My apologies.” And with that simple sentence, drops his eyes farther to continue work on his sword.

Anders tries to sit up, braces his elbows behind him, but grunts at the pain at the nexus of his ribs. He flops back onto the grass with a huff and stares up at the sky. He can tell where the city is by the light of the flames reflecting off the layer of low, dark clouds. Taking the moment to order his thoughts he finds very little to sort through. It was done. Everything was supposed to be over, his part in this world finished. But he was still here. By the grace of the elf who really ought to be arguing with him and yet isn’t.  
“Are you hurt?”

“No.” Even simpler, and this time the stone hardly pauses with his answer.

Anders tries again to sit upright, this time rolling onto his side first. He manages, and with his arms folded and resting against his lap, he watches Fenris sharpening his sword. "You’re not angry at me?“

“It doesn’t matter what I feel about it.” For all the gruffness one might expect of that, there is none, and perhaps because the words are true enough. Being angry won’t change Kirkwall.

Maybe he’s right. Anders goes silent, turning to look back at Kirkwall. He can see the empty space where the Chantry had stood. "You’ll be a fugitive now, is that what you want? There’s still a chance, you can take my head and bring it to Hawke, or to Meredith if he doesn’t survive. You’ll be a hero, you can live however you please. I won’t fight you. I wasn’t lying when I spoke to Hawke, I’ve made my peace.”

Fenris looks up at that, the stone stops again, and he stares at Anders in silence. Maybe he’s actually thinking it over, how much his love is actually worth. Maybe he’s wondering if the mage has finally completely lost it from all the guilt that must be weighing his shoulders. His eyes are impossible to read. “Is that your wish?”

What -does- he wish? What does he want, now that it might possibly matter? Anders looks back at Fenris, meeting his gaze. The ache of the bruise over his heart feels only to appropriate as he tries to read his lover’s impassive expression. He thinks he sees sorrow there, but then, those eyes always carry more than their share of sadness. "…My wish is for you to be free.“

That answer cracks a small, humorless smirk to the corner of Fenris’ mouth. “Your sentiment is appreciated. If I may. What exactly would you intend me be free of?”

"Dandruff. Athlete’s foot. Dwarven morning-breath.” Anders blinks in utter bewilderment, his cheeks even flushing with embarrassment that he doesn’t have a ready answer to that. "I… Come here, will you?“ His voice trembles.

The smirk fades just as quickly, though it almost wasn’t there to begin with anyway. The whet and sword are set aside, the sound of metal against boulder a far more unnatural and grinding sound than the supple and purposeful strokes he’d been making with the smaller stone. Fenris pushes himself off of the small slope he was perched on and rises, crosses the few feet between them and sits back down at Anders’ side, gaze casting outward toward the city. “We should move when you’re ready.”

Anders puts his hand over Fenris’s where it rests. He grips, squeezes gently. He wonders if he should ask again if this is what Fenris wants, but he can still remember the elf placing himself between him and the others, staring down Sebastian and even Hawke. He still remembers Fenris’s pommel hitting his chest just as he was about to speak his objection. This was what he’d chosen. "You saved my life,” he says quietly.

 

Then he pushes himself to his feet. He unties his hair and starts unbuckling his coat. "Let’s go, then. But… where?“

Fenris follows suit, eyes locked on the city as he rises. He finally decides nobody is coming for them, or at least not soon enough to be effective in a pursuit, and his chin turns decisively. There’s a small pause there, a moment of hesitance, but once it passes his voice is confident. “North. We reach the Minanter River before Sebastian and head west to the Hunterhorn Mountains. You could wait for Thedas to forget you, or remain there.”

Anders considers, and at length he nods. "We’d best move quickly then. We want to reach the mountains before all of Thedas knows we’ve got bounties on our heads. At least we’re traveling light.” His tone is a bit dry as he points out they have nothing but the clothes on their backs. He strips off his coat and rewraps his belt over his tunic. The coat he manages to roll into a neat bundle and tie at the end of his staff like a vagabond’s bindle, conveniently hiding the ornate staff-head in the process to disguise it as a simple walking stick.   
“If we run into anyone, try and act like I’m your porter. Make sure to seem tremendously bored of all the ‘human working an for an elf’ jokes that anyone we actually have to talk to is going to make. You’re striking and people will notice you no matter what we do, but it means I’ll fade to the background by comparison. Any pursuit is going to be looking for a mage accompanied by an elf, not an elven mercenary with a human servant.”

“As you wish.” Fenris glances to watch Anders transform himself best he can, then turns to retrieve his sword and mount it to his back once more. He can’t change so easily, still quite an elf with white hair and unique scars, but he’s been on the run before and this time he has an advantage. “Once we pass the mountains we should stay off the roads. We can survive far longer without meeting anyone than I had been able to.”

“I’ll follow your lead. You’re better at not getting caught.” Anders paces over to Fenris’s side, frowning faintly. "You’re sure you don’t want yell at me, or push me up against a wall and then yell at me or anything like that?“ The elf is subdued and Anders knows there are certainly reasons enough for that, but he’s beginning to seem almost … diffident.

“There aren’t any walls here.” The answer is possibly funnier for how flat it is, but before Anders can protest that it’s brushing away the question Fenris starts walking, back to the road for now, and he pauses once he steps onto the packed dirt to look back. “We should move on.”

"No– Wait– Look–” Anders finds himself stammering as he trails along after Fenris. "We can go to where there -is- a wall or you could use a tree or you could just hit me or… Why aren’t you angry at me? You have every right to be, I lied to you, I ruined your life, I nearly bereaved you – that’s a lot of reasons to be mad! “

Fenris doesn’t miss a step, or raise his voice. Maybe he’s just beyond yelling about it. Though that in itself is a worrying thought. "As I said. It doesn’t matter.”

“Why not? Why doesn’t it matter?”

“Do you think it would change anything?”

“I… I think…” Anders fumbles through his brain for a way to explain what’s bothering him and why, but he comes up empty-handed and he sighs, defeated. “I’m sorry.”

Fenris doesn’t answer at all, just continues on as if Anders hadn’t said it. And perhaps that’s worse.


	53. Chapter 53

Anders can’t blame Fenris for pushing on into the night. It was evening already when they started their trek and Fenris likely wanted to be far from the city by the time morning came. But it was dark, and Anders had nearly lost his footing a number of times. He could barely see beyond the elf’s shoulders and the glint of his sword on his back, mostly trusting to Fenris’s sharper senses. But perhaps most fatiguing is the elf’s silence. Fenris doesn’t speak a word, and Anders decides to let him be. But that leaves him alone with a head full of nagging doubts as he turns over their earlier conversation in his head.

 

They’re into the higher foothills before the mountain ridge when Fenris slows to a halt. The air smells damp here, with just a bit of a nip; any higher and they’d need to start a fire just to stay warm for the night. It would only be worse if they got rained on, like the clouds gathering higher up seem to be threatening to do. There’d been others they’d passed that he hadn’t alerted Anders to, likely some smaller bandit groups that wanted no part of whatever was happening, but they had all started to set camp as soon as the sun had sunk below the horizon. With a sigh he turns to glance back, past Anders towards the city, Kirkwall now a glowing orange hill on the black landscape and reflecting orange specks of light in his eyes. “We should leave the road and stop for the night.” 

“What’s left of it, you mean.” Anders looks back but quickly turns away from the burning ember on the horizon. His stomach is grumbling and empty, but he’s too tired to even suggest they try to find food. He moves in close, for a moment thinking of putting a hand on Fenris’s shoulder for the added guidance, but the way the elf seems to gaze past him makes him pause. He keeps his hands at his side.

Without any objections Fenris turns to walk into the forest. The trees are thinner here and sparser than they could be but the underbrush is thick, bushes large and reaching their chest in some places, and after carefully picking their way Fenris stops again not too far in. “Here.”  
So tonight, their bed is a larger tree creating a small nook amongst the larger bushes. Suddenly Hawke’s floor with a few piles of furs seems rich.

Anders draws in against the tree trunk and lowers himself to the ground, twigs catching at his clothing. At least the leaf litter seems soft, even though he chooses not to think about what might be living in it. He starts unwrapping his coat from his staff to pull it around himself like a blanket. “Why are you doing this?”

Whether or not Anders can truly see it Fenris casts a final watchful glance towards the path they left, pulling the heavy sword from his back and setting it to the ground as he turns and sits. For all the way he’s been acting thusfar, he settles down close, their shoulders snug against each other. And he seems wholly unconcerned with this question, only as much as if Anders had asked what some forgotten bruise was from. Though perhaps he’s just as exhausted as he should be, at this point. “Doing what?”

“Running away with me.” When Fenris settles so close against him, Anders wraps his coat around them both, his arm around Fenris’s back. Hours ago the answer to that had seemed obvious. Now, he isn’t so certain. Nothing seems certain.

Fenris sinks his back into the touch, only for his whole body to pause with Anders’ words. His chin shifts to look the mage in the eyes, maybe really look for the first time since the man woke up. The tone in his voice changes immediately, sincere and focused. “Is there something you would have me do instead?”

Fenris’s gaze is dazzling. Anders lets all his thoughts swirl away to stillness while he looks into those deep green eyes. Mute, he shakes his head. His body turns, his other arm crossing Fenris’s chest to complete the embrace as he leans in to kiss his lips.

Though Fenris moves closer and returns the kiss, his response is unlike the passionate fire he’s been before. ‘Casual’ hadn’t been a word that ever really defined him, but now; not cold but far subtler, gentler a touch than his lips have had in the past as they press to Anders’ skin. And yet, he seems no less sincere for it, this isn’t some placating move for someone he no longer cares about. When he parts away the movement is slow and careful, and only to glance out past the bushes surrounding them before dropping his forehead to Anders’ shoulder, arms crossed over his chest.

“I will spend the rest of my life making amends for what I’ve put you through,” Anders whispers, his cheek resting against Fenris’s hair. “And I will be glad for it. I’ve done what I needed to do. You’ve given me the chance to do what I /wanted/.”

“As you wish. I have no quarrel with you.” Back to the simple responses. Though he’s quieter now, head propped to Anders’ shoulder and an ear to the breeze.

“No quarrel with me?” Anders echoes the odd choice of words, plainly incredulous. He brushes Fenris’s hair back from his forehead and squints at him. "Funny, I don’t see a brand. And I’m fairly sure you weren’t a closet mage in the first place.“

Fenris flinches away and off Anders’ shoulder, snapping a wary glare that’s mostly lost in the night. It carries on his voice though, the faintest edge toning the words. “It was an apt term.”

"It’s the sort of thing an off-duty guard says to a street thug. No quarrel. You’re the only person in Thedas who has no quarrel with me after what I’ve done. That includes me and Justice, by the way.” The edge to Fenris’s tone is oddly reassuring, so Anders presses. If Fenris’s silence and formality are a sign of something festering, maybe this is a chance to lance the boil.

Of course, it couldn’t be so easy. Fenris retreats to crossing his arms over his chest, leaning back against the tree trunk and closing his eyes. “He still exists, then.” And that doesn’t sound as angry or bitter as Fenris has every right to be, either. More matter-of-fact observation than anything else.

“And you aren’t angry at me about that.” Not a question but a statement of observation. Anders does -look- questioning, though, watching Fenris’s composed features as well as he’s able to in the dark. He wants to believe this is some devious punishment Fenris has concocted, but he discards the notion quickly. Fenris, while often inscrutable, wasn’t very devious. And more importantly, even if he had just committed mass murder, not everything was therefore about -him-. "You’re not doing this on purpose.“

The best response Anders gets for that thoughtful speculation is a long, heavy sigh. “We’ll need to start at sunrise tomorrow if you want to keep ground against Sebastian.” Which of course, is long for go to sleep, mage. Though that’s not what he says.

"Of course.” Anders leans back against the tree trunk again, aching and exhausted. Perhaps its for the best that weariness wraps his thoughts like a blanket, weighs him down to the point where he can’t feel the amount of upset he knows he should.


	54. Chapter 54

The mountain path winds up a smaller ridge of the mountains, with Fenris mentioning a small town at the foot where they could gather supplies. Trees have thinned out the higher they’ve gone, any of them dwarfs to scrawny shrubs and the grass thick but short and barely passing the elf’s ankles. And little wonder the vegetation huddles closer to the ground and rocks, the wind not cold but still harsh and abrasive as it kicks up from the ocean. Kirkwall is still visible in the day, less the city itself and more the raising grey clouds that lazily begin to dissipate as they stretch across the sky. Whatever destruction had been caused there, the fires had been stamped out, the worst over.  
And Fenris is still silent, no longer casting glances back to what they left, without much of a word all day save a morning small offering of dried meat to the mage to carry them to the next meal.

Fenris’s silence begins to take second place to the hollow feeling in Anders’ stomach, yet Justice keeps pulling at his attention like a novice rider yanking at a horse’s reins. It’s unusually heavy-handed treatment from the spirit and it brings Anders face to face with their shared anxiety, their growing pile of unanswered questions about Fenris’s behavior. Justice has more to add to the stack, though Anders dismisses a number of them and settles a few others himself.  
Without food in his stomach and with barely any sleep the previous night, however, Anders is groggy, almost nodding off on his feet, trudging along as well as he can manage behind lithe, sure-footed Fenris. Justice lends him strength, and more and more often awareness, until he finally pulls Anders inward as if cradling the mage against his heart, letting his consciousness go dormant and sleep dreamlessly within their shared self.  
“Fenris. I have owed you an apology. I wish to set things right between us.” The spirit’s voice is distinct, though its hollowness is muted.

When Fenris stops to turn back it’s the first time he has all day, more than a quick glance over his shoulder whenever Anders makes the slightest misstep, a full pause and turn of his heel in the dirt, shoulder towards Justice. For all the exhaustion he likely feels his eyes are as alert as ever, those shoulders squared even more perfectly than they ever seemed to be in Kirkwall. “I don’t question what you’ve done.”

Justice gazes back at Fenris with the slightest interrogative tilt of his head. “I.. do not question the necessity of all we have done. I would not take back my actions, given the choice. And yet I feel…” He lowers his head, shakes it once. “I cannot regret this and yet I do. And though I have done worse to many more, what plagues me most is … lying to you. It was needful and yet I wish it were not so. I wish it most strongly. I am sorry.”

Fenris shifts in place, a slow lean to the farther heel that crumbles the dark dirt and pebbles under him. For the briefest moment his eyes falter then, a flicker across the man in front of him, but any reason for it is concealed. “It doesn’t matter. You did as you must.”

“No. It matters, or I would not have troubled you with my… my sentiment. I caused you grief. You had faith in me and I was… I was false. It was not deserved. It matters to me that you know this.” Anders’s face tightens, his eyebrows draw together over blue-glazed eyes and the shame Justice feels is plain to see. “I believed you would suffer less than you would if you had known the truth. Now I am not so certain the choice was mine to make.”

Finally Fenris’ expression changes, though not for the better, a small narrowing of his eyes and a turn of his chin as if to fight off whatever stronger emotions dwell deep in his chest. A snarl is more apparent in his voice, the words tainted by it no matter how hard he tries to keep that previous neutrality. “It wasn’t… it isn’t. Your purpose is to obey him and nothing further. Is that clear?”

Justice’s eyes snap back to Fenris’s face. He sees the tight little twist at the corner of Fenris’s mouth, the scowl the elf tries to subdue. His words cut deep. He stands there for a moment, lips parted but struck dumb. Fenris had grieved him, then saved him… or perhaps he had hoped he was saving only Anders. Justice had thought he’d been slowly getting better at reading the elf, but this he clearly hadn’t expected.  
Yet it’s soothing, in a way. It’s what he deserves. Even though his cheeks redden from being so chastised, he bows his head. “As you wish,” he says, before that hollow voice fades and the blue light in Anders’ eyes with it.  
The mage sways on his feet, tired and for a moment clearly disoriented. His hand rests over his heart for a moment, his expression puzzled, as if wondering why something suddenly hurts.

The venom behind Fenris’ features drains as immediately as Justice does. But he doesn’t turn to continue, instead staying to watch Anders and take stock of the both of them. When he does speak it’s polite, and pointedly gentler. “Any time we stop is longer until we reach the inn tonight.” Of course there were risks renting a room than gathering food and leaving to camp nearby. But news hadn’t made it out of Kirkwall, not so soon, and even if the innkeeper was questioned later there was little other direction to leave the city by foot.  
That, and Anders looked like he needed one more long night in a bed before they left the road entirely.

“So that is what you’ve done,” Anders says in words slurred with weariness. “You’ve absolved me by placing the blame on him. But why are you so distant now? Why… why are you acting more like my steward than my lover?” Posture slouched, Anders trudges forward again, not so much toward Fenris as along the road.

Once started Fenris watches Anders pass, then turns to follow at his side, if one step behind. “I don’t blame him, I was reminding him of his place.”

Those words are harsh, even if Fenris’s tone somehow isn’t. Too tired to think twice, Anders casts a glare back over his shoulder. “Don’t be a Templar,” he snaps.

“Apologies.” The single word of a reply darts from Fenris’ lips just as fast, quieter than most of the firm authoritative sound he’s had thusfar. “It won’t happen again.”

So… demure. Anders had only ever seen Fenris act this way around Hawke, and even then he had been less subdued. Less restrained. And gradually he had begun to relax. But now he was all formality, crisp and proper, not cold precisely but there was no longer any of that brash anger or familiar sarcasm. Anders pauses in his tracks, looks back over his shoulder again, just needing to see the elf’s face. He has enough of the pieces now, he realizes, to puzzle out the bodyguard’s strange behavior, and as he does, his composure crumbles and leaves anguish and yearning on his face. “/Fenris./”

Fenris pauses, again, gaze singularly focussing to Anders’ expression at those words. It would take them so much longer to get to the inn at this rate, but this was so much more important. Whatever it was, /whatever he’d done/. So he stops, feet uneasy as he shifts his weight on them, betraying his otherwise cool exterior and eyes. “What?”

Anders steps closer. He reaches for Fenris’s hands, the motion slow when he notices that nervous shift from foot to foot, the restrained stance that seems so much more carefully composed then Fenris’s usual lank, effortless grace. He offers the chance to pull away, or perhaps the chance to quell that impulse. "I love you,“ he says in a quiet voice. He keeps his eyes on Fenris’s face. "Do you understand?”

That question doesn’t get an easy response like it should have, and would have just a few days ago. Fenris’ eyes trail downward towards the offered touch, doesn’t flinch when they make contact and lightly grip him, but his gaze lingers there, falls farther to the ground between them. He doesn’t look up when he finally answers with a quieter, “Yes.”

Anders lifts Fenris’s hands and draws him forward with just a gentle urging. He wraps his arms around his lover and leans against him, eyes closed with trapped tears burning beneath the lids. Of course he says what he’s supposed to. What he’s expected to, or what he believes he is. Only more proof that he doesn’t understand at all, not yet. /Not yet./ "You are my life,“ he whispers in Fenris’s ear before he draws back. When he opens his eyes again, there’s nothing in his gaze but warm adoration. "Let’s keep moving, now.”


	55. Chapter 55

The room they rent for the night is small, barren, little more than a single room with a window and a bed. A couple flat pillows, an all too thin scratchy blanket on a crunchy mattress and a rug that had plenty of holes in it and dried mud. Below was a small tavern, that only served ale worse than anything the Hangman had and whatever food happened to be stewing in the pot at the time. But it was hot food, and a bed all the same, and as they’d entered the building Fenris changed immediately once he crossed through the door. Taller, easily stronger by his stride, and ahead of Anders by a few feet to let the man trail behind him. When asked what beds they’d need he’d only replied with ‘whatever’s cheapest’ in the same way that meant the man behind him was used to sleeping on the floor.  
Not that it turned out that way as once they were in the room the facade vanished, and despite any previous hesitation on the road Fenris sheds his clothes methodically and pulls up the covers to curl up at Anders’ side.

Anders wraps his arms, and as much of himself as he can manage, around Fenris once the elf climbs into bed. While still lacking a hot bath, Anders is tired enough that the itching at his scalp and under the growing bristles of his beard barely bother him. He has a belly full of stew, light on the meat but still more nourishing than anything they’ve had in days, and with the blanket over them and Fenris in his arms, he feels almost content. He presses his lips and the stubble around them to Fenris’s temple, murmuring a weary “my love” as he does.

There’s not even a candle to each room, or at least not this one where everything seems to be made of straw and cloth, only the hall lit and the bed left to the darkness of a cloudy sky. Distantly Fenris is aware of that, not even a moon out the window and a night nobody would usually press on through unless with elves. But with Anders’ words he shifts his focus, turns his body under the arms draped across him then moves, an elbow crossing over Anders’ chest to prop the elf as he leans in to find the mage’s mouth with his.

Anders meets that kiss with a breathless moan. For this entire dogged, desperate march to the mountains Fenris has barely spoken. The restrained propriety the elf has retreated into has left Anders lonely, starving for some sign of tenderness, and now it feels like rain on parched earth when Fenris puts his lips to his. His hands settle at the small of Fenris’s back and it feels like the first time he’s felt that supple curve under his palms, the hard muscle that moves under soft skin and the sense of the lithe taper of the elf’s waist. Anders’s heart begins to pound.

The kiss feels true enough, Fenris’ hands closing in and spreading over the span of Anders’ shoulders to steady himself. But as he pulls back from that touch, figure just a darker blot in the dark room, he pauses too long, longer than just lingering over Anders’ eyes or the tiredly grateful expression likely crossing his face. Eventually his head tips down again, this time lips brushing over the center of Anders’ collar and brow to that stubbly chin, but with no express energy backing it. Waiting.

Anders’ cock is hard under Fenris’s belly, the mage conscious suddenly of how long it’s been since they’ve made love, how long weariness and grief and fear have gotten in the way. He’s so tired his thoughts blur together, his limbs feel heavy, but the need for more is strong enough to keep him awake. Strong enough to make him ache when no more comes, when Fenris simply nuzzles in against his throat and his collarbone. "Maker’s breath, are you trying to make me beg?“

A quiet gulp and that energy is back again, Fenris lifting his chin to Anders’ lips again and a hand trailing from a shoulder over crests of worn down muscles and along the chest and then stomach. As their kiss breaks for a small gasp of air he replies a quick, “No, s-” and stops just as shortly. But no silence hides that suffocated word, no distance between them to pretend it was something imagined.

Anders goes pale. His cock softens and his gorge rises, enough that he gags and has to push Fenris off him to roll to one side of the bed. With some effort he keeps his supper down. He coughs, then looks over his shoulder at Fenris, incredulous and horrified. "I’m not him.”

Fenris might as well have frozen where he fell, still a heap on his side with a hand pressed to the mattress to brace himself from Anders’ shove. A silence falls between them, a small mountain chill breezing in the open window all the more noticeable from the disarray of sheets, at once awkward and damning. “I’m well aware.” The elf replies with a flat tone, at least some sort of emotion there, better than nothing.

Anders pushes himself upright to sit on the edge of the bed. He bows his head, braces his elbows on his knees and feels as if the weight of all he’s done is starting to settle on his shoulders. So Fenris had no quarrel with him. No anger. It didn’t change the fact that he’d broken the elf’s trust in him. It didn’t change the fact that he’d made himself again into simply “a mage.” But… he was, at least, Fenris’s mage. "But you’ve put me in his place,“ he murmurs.

It earns another silence, but not nearly as long as the last one. Fenris watches Anders from his spot, knotting muscles beginning to soften as the mage settles with a small but important distance between them. The cool voice returns, matter of fact and simple. “You put yourself in that place.”

"Then let me put myself right back out of it!” Anders snaps. "I am your lover, not your master. I would never have asked you to sacrifice your freedom.“

Fenris’ head turns downward to the bed, the shift of his weight heard if not entirely seen. “You should sleep while we have time here.”

"Why?” Anders shifts, propping one knee up on the bed’s straw mattress and half-turning. "What does it matter, now?“

“As you wish.” Likely Fenris knows full well Anders’ intent to the question, the overarching point, but purposely takes it simply as he settles back down to the pillow. It’s just easier.


	56. Chapter 56

Hours later, when Fenris is fast asleep, Anders slips from the bed. The floorboards creak under his bare feet so he moves carefully. In the nighttime silence it sounds so loud, but Fenris doesn’t stir. Another creak and groan and Anders kneels down at the room’s single window. This far from any cities, this close to the mountains, the night sky is at last clear and full of stars.

“Andraste, Bride of the Maker…” Anders mouths the words, barely voicing them, and the muted sound ends in a choke as his throat closes on its own. "…please hear my prayer.“ He folds his hands, holds them level with his heart.

"I know that… we are not exactly on speaking terms, here. And after what I’ve done you owe me nothing. But I come to you not for my own sake but… for someone I love. I’m begging you not to let him suffer for what I’ve done. He doesn’t deserve it. He’s done nothing to deserve any of the hardship in his life. He struggles every day with fear and pain and loneliness and anger, and all of it was just… inflicted on him by cruel and selfish people. People like me. If I’m punished for the things I’ve done so be it. I accept that. But he shouldn’t have to suffer because of me. He shouldn’t have to suffer ever, for any reason.”

Anders swallows hard, his hands clenched before him. He glances to the bed out of the corner of his eye and the lens of his tears makes Fenris’s sleep-touseled hair a misty silver blur. "I’ve done so much wrong. And I want nothing more now than to make things right for him. But… Andraste, I don’t know how. I don’t know what to do.“

He stifles a sob that wracks him, bends his back like a weight on his shoulders, and kneels there in silence, waiting for an answer. Waiting while the sting of his anguish subsides and leaves him feeling purged, his spirit blasted to a ringing clarity in the silence of the night.

What can he do? 

He found the breaking point for the Kirkwall circle. He destroyed the city’s chantry in the name of Justice. He did what he had thought was impossible… given the mages at least a fighting chance against opression. If he had done all this, there had to be a way to do something for Fenris.

To heal him.

He could leave. But if Fenris wanted to live without him, he wouldn’t have knocked him senseless and dragged him from Kirkwall. What did that say about the elf? That he would rather be a slave and with Anders, than free and Anders dead? The mage’s cheeks flush hot in the cool air of the room. If Fenris loved him that dearly, he should be ashamed to even think of running from him, whatever intentions he used to justify it. He could hear in his mind echoes of all the times Fenris had accused him of trying to run. Leaving was out of the question.

But staying would /hurt/.

Fenris had withdrawn into himself and put up so many walls. Every time he ran up against those stoic defenses, Anders could only remind himself that they were justified. That Fenris had raised them up and retreated because of what he had done. Lies he had told and lives he had taken.

But hadn’t he said he could face punishment? Hadn’t he said he deserved it?

It would hurt but it would be survivable. He would be alone, and yet not. The one he loved was alive, and loved him, and needed him. Needed him to be constant, and strong, and gentle.

He could be gentle. He could spend the rest of his life being gentle to Fenris. It was all he had ever wanted to be to him. Gentle, kind, a healer.

What can he do? He can love Fenris.


	57. Chapter 57

Fenris sleeps soundlessly into the night, a deep motionless slumber that only vaguely stirs when the mage slinks back into bed and curls up at his side. A distant comfort, but for whatever his reasons may be he buries his face to the crook of Anders’ shoulder.  
Unfortunately morning comes early, and far earlier than it had any right to if the night was wasted on anything other than sleep. He rises with it, lids opening without the slightest flutter to them, shifts onto one side with an elbow shoved under himself. There rests Anders, so less troubled this way. For the barest moment it crosses Fenris’ mind to leave, if he’s such a burden.  
But instead he leans in, lips to the man’s ear, well aware that he’s about to ruin that calm expression. “We should leave before anyone else wakes up.”

Anders opens his eyes. The shadows under them are still heavy, but he smiles a groggy little smile, all tender fondness at the face so close to his own. "You’re right,“ he murmurs, then stretches and yawns, doing his best to cover his mouth. "I’m sorry I snapped at you last night. Do you think we might scare up something to eat before we go, or would you weigh it too risky?” He’s tired, certainly. And his face scrunches as he stretches and sits up, rolling his shoulder until the joint pops. But he seems untroubled, as if a night of sleep helped him put much of his grief behind him.

With a small, single nod Fenris pulls away to get to sit up, eyes tearing from the man at his side to glance towards the door and weigh their options. “The innkeep will see us leave, might as well. If nobody has stormed our room yet, they’re not going to.” He moves again with that matter settled, carefully picking himself from Anders’ grasp and getting up to put on his clothes. The ones he didn’t sleep in, at any rate. “Sebastian may find out that we were here, but there is little other way to leave Kirkwall by land.”

“True enough.” Anders rises, stretches again and yawns mightily. He makes a brief attempt at combing his hair with his fingers, then starts pulling his clothes on, sans the coat that he’s taken to keeping bundled at the end of his staff. "Maybe we can get some bread and boiled eggs for later, as well.“ He falls silent, thinking while he laces his boots. "We need provisions. Have you got anything in mind?”

Fenris sighs, turns back as he straps the sword behind him. “There are enough farms and taverns along this road that sell dried meat and fruit. If we spend a day we can dry anything else we need. Once we leave the road to follow the river… I don’t know.”

“Not the first time I’ve wished Isabela were here,” Anders sighs. "It’s been a long time since I’ve done any pilfering. I need a cloak. We need a bow and arrows to hunt with, and a tinderbox to start the camp fires. If we follow the river we’ll at least have fish, but I know you’d prefer game when we can get it. We’re going to need to be careful, because if we drop a lot of coin in one place, we’ll be remembered for it.“ Anders takes his staff bindle over one shoulder and straightens his belt. 

“I have enough coin to take us to the river. And a small tinderbox, though I didn’t think fire would be a problem.” Of course, because where else would Fenris think the safest place for money is if not on his person. For a moment he looks more as he used to, too busy thinking to monitor his expression so firmly. “We could stop at every market we come across and gather slowly if you wish. I will be remembered either way, unfortunately.” 

“Then perhaps it would be more prudent to barter for what we can at the first opportunity, and then keep away from people as much as we’re able.” Anders considers pointing out that he could always go to one of these markets alone, but he realizes he’s nearly as uneasy with that idea as Fenris probably would be. "Let’s go, love. I’m ready.“

A curt nod and Fenris moves to open the door, shoulders already squaring out to take on the small act they’ve put on for the inn. “We should find oiled cloaks as soon as we can, or the rain might kill us far more easily than anyone looking for us.”

It takes no effort at all for Anders to appear tired and disheveled, but he lets his shoulders round into a deeper slouch as he follows Fenris through the door. "As you say,” he murmurs, his tone mild.


	58. Chapter 58

It’s a good day for traveling. The sky is clear, and even though the air is cool the day gets warmer as the sun rises in the sky. With the Vimmark mountains behind them, the trek down the foothills is pleasantly easy, and they keep parallel to the road but a good distance away from it, traveling through orchards and tall grass. Anders plucks some under ripe apples from the trees they pass beneath, folding a pocket from the hem of his tunic to carry them in. "Want one?“ He calls ahead after pulling a particularly nice fruit from a branch above his head.

Fenris has been a few steps ahead for some time, what with not being busy picking at the trees and having a knack for walking with a purpose, but he halts to let Anders catch up. It would be a lie to say that he isn’t hungry, and a stupid one when they may not see a full meal for quite some time.   
It’s as good an excuse to stop for a moment, anyway, the smaller trees shading them. “Did you do this often in Ferelden?”

Anders flashes a grin at that question. "Often as I could, and even before the Circle got me.” He polishes the apple on his tunic and tosses it to Fenris, stepping forward to join him in the shade of one of the trees. "What about you? I’m lucky you seem to know the region as well as you do, but I guess it makes sense. You must have come this way when you fled south before. This is further north than I’ve ever been, you know.“

Fenris catches it, and gives a small nod before he shifts his eyes towards the landscape. "The last time I was here was with a group of three mercenaries. We had a habit of finding most of our food in taverns. Luckily there are plenty along the road.” Which is to say Fenris did, whether he was with sellswords or not. But he’s talking, with the tones a confident slave would but still more than he’s said most of their journey.

“Maybe we can trade for a shaving kit in one of them.” Anders rubs a hand across his three-day growth of beard. “I don’t know how you can stand to kiss me with this briar patch on my face.” He pulls another apple – small, green, and hard – out of the makeshift pouch of his folded tunic, and he bites into it, juice running down his bristly chin. The taste is tart, but fine, and it does remind him of orchards outside Highever, of pilfering fruit and running from farmhands.

The question interrupts Fenris’ eating once he finally starts to, and he turns his attention back to Anders as he swallows. He looks suddenly wary, though at least now he doesn’t look half ready to bolt. “It’s.. my place to stand it for you.”

“No,” Anders says. He shakes his head, but his voice is soft. He sits down beside Fenris and the ground is soft and cool. “That’s not how it should work. How would you feel if your kisses were just something I put up with? If I kiss you and it doesn’t please you it kind of defeats the purpose.”

“It doesn’t matter.” Fenris’ eyes trail down but they don’t follow Anders as he sits, instead to the ground in front of him, but they shoot back to the other man as he adds, “-if you shave. I don’t mind it.”

“Then I’ll shave because it itches like a case of crabs.” Underneath the gingery bristles of his beard, Anders’s smile is slanted but warm. “How’d you sleep last night, by the way?”

Fenris’ brow furrows, the question and why Anders would ask it puzzling. “Did I wake you?” A small frown traces over his expression as he asks. He might as well have, if Anders stayed up for a good while in thought when Fenris slept away. “I apologize for last night.”

Anders shakes his head. "I had to think some things through – nothing you need to apologize for. You were sleeping soundly when I finally drifted off. I appreciated having a bed for the night. I’m sorry I didn’t say so before.“ He falls silent for a moment, just a brief one. "Guess you stayed there years ago with the mercenaries you mentioned. How’d you manage to afford hired swords, by the way? Come to think of it, you’ve always been pretty good at earning coin and holding onto it.” Unlike certain apostates he can think of.

A small smirk curls then, a tiny one, almost afraid of being noticed. “I did. As soon as I could I sold my sword for something less… ornate. Hired several groups of them before I realized I could usually take my cost back when they died or were drunk with cards. Cards are easier when you’ve been a slave for your whole life.”

“Really? Why wo–… oh.” For a moment Anders looks quizzical, but his own mind pulls the answer to his question from right in front of his face. That terrible, intolerable restraint Fenris has. That’s what it is to have lived as a slave. His cheeks flush with shame and he bows his head, lank straw-colored hair falling forward to hide his face. "Then I guess I’d have been as shit at slaving as I am at wicked grace.“ He manages a flat chuckle, then bites into his apple again. "Back then… what did you do if you felt homesick?”

“Homesick?” Even now the balk in Fenris’ voice is clear and unfiltered, before he has a chance to compose himself. With a quiet sigh he settles to the ground at Anders’ side, nobody is going to find them in the middle of an orchard. “I didn’t. I played cards, and I drank to pass the time to when I would have to run and hide again.”

Anders raises his head, wearing a lopsided smile. "Glad to know you didn’t leave anything behind that mattered to you. Were you a wine drinker even then? Ale’s cheaper.“ He leans against the trunk of the tree behind them, almost shoulder to shoulder with Fenris.

“Perhaps. But the cheapest wine is enough to please the barkeep without him thinking you have too much coin on you.” A small pause, and then Fenris adds, “I wasn’t aware you were so interested.”

Anders replies with a vague shrug. "I was just never much for wine – not until we started living together, anyway. And wondering what you thought of the Marches when they were new to you. I’ve heard you talk about how you’ve felt alien here… I avoided bringing it up because I thought it hurt you to talk about.”

Wine Fenris would much rather have at hand while discussing such things. But situations are as they are, and apples are the only thing they have to collect their thoughts on. “I don’t know what I expected when I escaped. That elves had spent their freedom more wisely, perhaps. Or anyone else. It was as if the outskirts of Minrathous just stretched outward and I’d never really left Tevinter at all.” He huffs at that, and dips his head to take another bite of apple. “It doesn’t matter anymore, in any case.”

Anders watches Fenris’s jaw work as he chews the apple. "Maybe, maybe not. If you’d been born to freedom, what would you want to have spent it on?“ He bends his knees, bracing his arms against them, looking a bit like an interrogative child.

“…I don’t know. Far less running.”

Anders smiles at that. "But it’s kept you in -fabulous- shape.”

“Fortunately we will be running for some time, if you prefer me that way.” Fenris could only sound halfway normal again for so long.

Anders sighs heavily, slumping forward against his knees. "I don’t think my preference should figure into how you are. It never has before and I fell for you head over heels, didn’t I?“

“I don’t imagine I changed much from when you first saw me. I hadn’t spent much time in Kirkwall… it matters more, now.”

"Does it? Why?” Anders turns his head, looking at Fenris curiously.

Fenris drops his head back to the trunk of the tree, with a sigh that either sounds like Anders asked a really hard question, or an obvious one. Impossible to tell which, and Fenris likely won’t be offering the answer. “How far do you want to go today?”

“Far. If we can get to the farmsteads we can find a hayloft to sleep in.” At least now Anders knows Fenris can be coaxed out of this shell he’s retreated into. He wishes he could focus on nothing else, but Fenris is right. They have more immediate concerns. But as he pushes himself to his feet, the look of longing in his eyes says as loud as words that he’d like nothing more than his lover in his arms and a bed under them.

Fenris follows suit as Anders gets up, and as one can practically see the protective wall go back up as he straightens. With a core tossed away and quick brush of his gauntlets across his clothes to shake the grass off he begins to look silently confident as he did at the inn. Only small, important changes; a dip in his chin, the way his shoulders are formed but not so perfectly he appears taller by presence alone. And he waits. “We should pass several before nightfall.”


	59. Chapter 59

There is no trailing long into the night, this time. Perhaps because Anders stayed awake at the in. The barn stands well enough away from the house, and the land stretches to the farthest hills with not another soul or sign of civilization. Neither of them are as tired as they could be if they kept dogging onward, they sky pale and tall crops washed in grey and blue shadows just as the sun drifts behind the mountains at their back.  
The hinges on the barn creak, would more if they weren’t already ajar from the wind. The ladder creaks more, each plank sagging with the weight of Fenris’ sword, wood grey and green in spots. In the loft bales of hay have grown old, flattened by weather coming in through a hole in the roof, but tonight the sky is clear and it only makes the straw under Fenris’ feet soft and less prickly. As Anders makes his way up the ladder Fenris looks the space over, and turns. “This should suffice, for the night.”  
And yet in a questioning edge; if Anders were to take issue they could leave immediately.

“This is perfect,” Anders confirms. And it is, right now. He climbs the ladder to the hay loft, tossing his staff up ahead of him. From the condition of the ladder and the barn door blowing loose in the wind, it doesn’t seem likely they’ll be discovered here. Anders crawls over the matted-down straw, picking a sheltered corner to spread his coat like a blanket. He can smell dust and hayblossoms and a hint of cow, and it sparks memories. He shakes his head without realizing it while his memories turn towards sparks, the heat of licking flames on his face, the bellows of panicking animals. He looks at the palms of his hands and remembers how they’d looked back then, smaller, bony wrists sticking out of the cuffs of a shirt too small for him. Decades ago in a barn like this one, his life had started to go horribly wrong.  
Anders forces a smile, a sudden bright bark of laughter. “You know, once I was old enough to think about that kind of thing, I always thought I’d lose my virginity in a place like this. Mentioned it to Karl but he said he didn’t think it was worth going Apostate just to have me in a hay-bale when he had a perfectly good bed.”

Fenris almost jumps at the sound, a small flinch though not painful to look at. For all that the day has been pleasant his nerves are likely half shot, passing the time listening for distant sounds muffled by the gravel and dirt and grass and leaves under feet and shoes and a staff. Now he can finally begin to relax, rather sure nobody saw them, and his shoulders sinking the way his sword does once he unstraps it and sets it to a nearby pile. A part of it all was amusing, that it seemed easier to run from Kirkwall after destroying part of the city, than a single slave running from a very rich Magister. Though perhaps one had more of an investment to lose and less distractions.  
It was impossible trying to listen anymore anyway, the sky darkening and the frogs already beginning a small marble-clicking racket. “What gave you that assumption?”

Anders lays back against the straw under his coat. “Because I was a farm boy and farm boys get laid in hay lofts. It’s an absolute truth of the natural world.” He stretches his arms behind his head and shuts his eyes, breathing deeply. If he doesn’t think too much about how they got here and why, he can almost relax. It’s a peaceful night, and the frogs and crickets are singing. It makes him think of a warm bed, a warm hearth he knew so long ago. The sound of his mother’s rocking chair while she did her embroidery. An orange cat between his feet. A life where he was safe, and wanted. “I was probably conceived in one myself, though I try not to think about that.”

Fenris sits in the hay, waiting specifically for Anders to sit before following suit at his side. Legs tuck under him neatly, one foot propped to the other knee and turned upward in his hands. The grass surrounding the barn took most of the dirt but the pads of his feet are still as black as the stirrup protecting the arch, and he rubs at the thicker caked mud with a little frown. “Are farmhands averse to beds?”

“Most farmhands have parents, grandparents, brothers, and sisters who live under the same roof. Often in the same room.” Anders scoots closer as Fenris examines his feet. He leans over the edge of the loft to see if there’s a milking pail anywhere in the barn that looks like it could still hold water. Sure enough there is one, the sides a bit pocked with rust but no holes eaten through yet. “Hold on,” Anders says as he crawls back to the ladder and swings his legs down. “I’ll give you a hand washing up.”

Fenris reaches a hand after Anders, too late, with a quick, “You don’t have to-” but he’s already heading down the ladder. The hand hangs in the air a moment then drops, lamely. Back up in the loft there’s a soft “as you wish”, but then Fenris adds, “If there are so many people, wouldn’t they notice you were missing just as easily?” Though, really, he probably already knows the answer to that question. Slaves were packed in just as tightly, knew everything about each other, and didn’t ask questions when two went missing for a while.

“Eventually, but everyone has things to do. And a missing farm-boy is just as likely to be down at the pond fishing and drinking ale as compromising a neighbor’s daughter’s honor.” Anders returns quickly with the pail hanging from one arm. He settles in the loft, facing Fenris this time, setting the bucket at his feet. He extends his hands over it and droplets of water condense on his skin. Just a little at first, and then more, until a steady stream of clear water is trickling into the pail. “Did that a fair deal myself, except my Da brewed stronger things than beer.”

There might have been a sharp comment about magic, at one time, and the absence makes for a distinctive silence as Fenris watches the water and the creation of it from Anders’ palms. A passing interest, the same he had for when the mage ate an apple, lost on the wonder any other non-mage might have. “Did you ever want to return to it? It’s very.. different, from what you’ve seen.”

Anders is quiet a moment before he answers, attention focused on his conjuring. Eventually the pail is full to an inch or two below the brim, and Anders reaches out to guide one of Fenris’s feet into his lap. “I did. All the time.” His voice is soft and sober. “I had a family and I spent my days out under the sky whether I was at my chores or shirking them. If I made trouble I’d get a lashing but that was all, it was over and Ma and Da would just look for more ways to keep me too busy for mischief.”

It seems more than an honest answer. An obvious one. Fenris dips his head, and doesn’t comment further for his foot finding itself in Anders’ lap. “That was a foolish question. I’m sorry.”

Anders’s gaze flickers up to meet Fenris’s. “No, it’s alright.” He props Fenris’s ankle against his knee and begins to wash the dirt away, scrubbing the soles of Fenris’s feet with his own lightly calloused hands, all poised over the pail of water. “It hurts a bit, but… it’s good to talk about. Even if those are times I can never go back to, I’m glad I have the memories. I’m glad.. for the way you make me remember there’s more to life, more to me, than magic.”

Beyond a small huff Fenris doesn’t protest even as he pulls into an awkward position, dropping back to his elbows on the light slope of cool hay and one foot raised. The movement fluffs some air from the pile, casting up a wonderful and somewhat nostalgically familiar smell of moss, nature-aged wood and damp grass. “What you did in Kirkwall isn’t about magic,-” The sentence pauses distinctly, his tone unfinished, but he leaves it be, a word abandoned at the last moment.

“You’re finally ready to share your opinion about that?” A smile tugs at the corners of Anders’ mouth, not even a sad one, because he knows what word Fenris held back. Even a near miss like that is progress. He shifts himself, and the bucket with him, to try and make the arrangement less ungainly for Fenris while he rubs the dirt off the pads of his feet. He massages those high-arched feet while he cleans them, pressing gently with the ball of his thumb.

Fenris watches Anders, wary, words rolling around in his mind before he replies. “It was about one group controlling another. That’s all there is.” Well, if by opinion Anders meant an observational fact. Still, despite the initial hesitancy Fenris sighs, his shoulders arching higher as his weight leans into them.

Anders is more careful as he spreads Fenris’s toes and cleans between them, doing his best not to tickle him accidentally, to keep his touch firm and slow. Fenris’s reply has a sort of deliberate ambiguity that Anders notices, but at least he didn’t evade it entirely and change the subject. Yet it puts that day’s events in mind again and the guilt he feels is nauseating. “I never knew how much I could regret doing something I was so… so sure of.”

Fenris glances up towards Anders, would sit up if not for his precarious position. Instead the motion turns into a shift of his weight against the hay and Anders’ hands. “Would you have done any differently?” But there is no eagerness, no hope Anders would renounce doing such a thing, only interest.

Anders frowns and bows his head. He lets Fenris’s foot go, having done as good a job as he can, and having drifted into thought. “I… I still think…” He hesitates, his face drawing tight. “…No. If that were put before me again… /no/.” He coughs, covers his face with muddy hands.

Fenris does sit up then, the moment he can. His chin dips as his gaze drops to the ground, but not in shame or fear, simply thought. One that finishes with what he voices. “If you would change nothing, then there is nothing to regret. There is no use dwelling on it.”

“No, I meant… I don’t know what I meant. Even knowing why it had to be done… I could not do a thing like that a second time. I can’t go through that again, it’s too much to even contemplate.” Anders rubs the heels of his hands into his eyes, pulling in a long, deep breath before he removes them. He reaches for Fenris’s other foot. “What I dwell on is that you’d pull me out of a fire I started myself.”

“It would be my honor to.” Fenris’ words are strange. No matter how genuine he may sound, how much he may truly mean the sentiment underlining his words, everything he says is couched in such politeness that it makes the words ring hollow. An easy way to obscure true opinions, but it doesn’t seem that way. Something else is making him remember old, branded to memory rules.

“Your honor,” Anders echoes quietly. He casts a longing look over at Fenris before he turns his attention back to cleaning the bare foot in his hands. “I’m so much in your debt, regardless. If I spend the rest of my life thanking you, it still wouldn’t be enough.”

 

“If you wish to.” The words soften like Anders’ fading comment, and for a few moments Fenris is silent as he watches hands work through the grime and massage away the knots in his muscles. It was strange, thinking his foot was stiff, but even with daily activity over the years this exodus is beginning to show wear on him. Sleep aside, he hasn’t looked quite so exhausted for some time. The facade must be slipping, or he trusts the dimming light against Anders’ eyes more than he should. “Do you enjoy this?”

Anders smiles. He doesn’t glance up as he carefully scrubs dirt and mud out of the fine, swirling crevasses of the callouses padding Fenris’s feet. The evening light casts soft shadows in the lines of Anders’ face, and each one is like a written volume on tenderness. “Of course,” he says. “I treasure this,” he adds, and his voice drops to a low, shy murmur. “Touching you… soothing you, or pleasing you. And when I can, serving you.”

Something in this answer sets Fenris off, an uncomfortable shifting from his hips out to the calf resting on Anders’ thigh and the sole in his hands. “You shouldn’t let anyone else hear you say that.”

“If that is your wish,” Anders says mildly. But when he glances up, there’s a gentle teasing glimmer in his eyes. Finally, he lets go of Fenris’s foot, lets it rest in the straw while he crawls up to lay against Fenris’s side. “I love you,” he says, head down, eyes locked on Fenris’s through a veil of lank straw-colored hair. “And I love to touch you.” His fingers reach for Fenris’s heavy belt. 

Fenris rolls to one shoulder, errant pieces of straw crushed between their clothes from how close he presses. As he leans in his lips touch the corner of Anders’ mouth, a gentle gesture at first, then trails small tugs at his bottom lip to finally parting his own at the center. If words don’t do him any favors lately, best not to say anything at all, and maybe they can try this again.

Anders slips an arm under the curve of Fenris’s waist and wraps it tight around him. He’s hard against Fenris’s hip, and his tongue slips past Fenris’s teeth almost furtively. His breath is warm while his mouth is cool, and his kiss slips deeper , tongue tensing firm to fill Fenris’s mouth. He presses a cupped palm to the bulge in Fenris’s leggings, rubbing him through his clothes while his thumb hooks through the laces of his pants and starts to tug. There are no more words from Anders either. Only kisses and shaking, panting breaths.

And not a sound. Fenris is quiet, not a single moan or grind of encouragement even as he hardens under the touch, just an unsteady, long sigh through his nose. His elbow digs into the straw, props him up to lean farther over Anders and draw a free hand to his chest. The touch is light though, not a rough grip but spread fingers and unrestricting palm, like it would fall away at the barest protest. But it does draw down, the pads on his fingertips dragging through clothes and metal claws pointed well away from skin. Then, with a murmur past their lips, he finally speaks. “We don’t have oil or baths between us.” What he has in mind is clear enough, the way he seems half ready to sit up and the tip of his head downward, but he doesn’t mention it. It would be too many words, trying to run away with him again.

Anders reads Fenris’s posture effortlessly, but rather than roll onto his back, he …parries. He dips his head down, lips and stubble dragging at Fenris’s throat. He presses his hand to Fenris’s shoulder to push him down into the straw. “I can still suck you,” he murmurs, a sensual purr in his voice in spite of how tired, how filthy and bedraggled they both are. He tugs the laces of Fenris’s breeches until they finally have enough slack for him to roll them down. He reaches under the taut leather, his cupped hand lifting Fenris’s cock and balls free of his pants. Rather than wrap his hand around the shaft, he teases along it’s length with the tips of his fingers, a light, fleeting touch that darts away up the centerline of Fenris’s belly, toying with the toggles of his vest.


	60. Chapter 60

The sun rises, warm light trickling into the barn through the cracks between weathered boards. Sunbeams pour down on Anders’ bare shoulder, his travel-stained tunic pulled askew. He has his arm around the lean, lithe body next to him, his hand under Fenris’s open vest. He wakes to this, and the taste of stale hay-pollen in his mouth. Squinting up at the barn’s roof he tries to make a guess at how high the sun is, but if it’s this high in the sky they’ve slept later than they meant to. "Fenris.“ He murmurs his lover’s name into his ear.

The only response is a twitch at first, a tickle on the leading edge of an eartip and hint of scruff at the lobe. Then a slow inhale, deeper and longer than the last, as Fenris stirs. His eyes crack open, then upward, likely coming to the same conclusions that Anders did about how long they’ve slept, and with a subtle stretch of his shoulders he pulls himself upright. As if he could conclude something from the sky by getting a better look at it, through the small hole in a dilapidated barn roof. Fenris’ eyes, and his chin, fall back to land on Anders with a quiet, "We should go.”

Anders presses a kiss against the downy hair at Fenris’s temple. That and a short, gentle squeeze, and he lets go. He pushes himself up on all fours, whipping his head back and forth to try and shake some of the straw from his hair. Then he’s bundling his coat again, belting his tunic and pulling it straight. He doesn’t bother with the ladder. He takes his staff in one hand and pushes off the edge of the hayloft, landing in a crouch.

For all the impressions elves give of being light and quiet on their feet Fenris is anything but as he follows suit moments later. The plates of his gauntlets give a muffled clatter and with the sword he falls like a brick, heels landing hard against the packed dry earth. But he straightens easily, and paces past Anders towards a small gap in the far wall where light trails in. A frown draws on his face, small but still there as he turns away from what he’s seen. “They’ll see us. We shouldn’t go back to the road.”

“The woods, then.” Anders steps up behind Fenris, looking out at the wheat field surrounding the old barn. He draws a few seep breaths and stretches his back and his legs. “Ready when you are.”

There’s a noticeable pause at those words, Fenris searching for some way to deflect when they leave being up to him, but he comes up empty handed. He nods, maybe a bit too abruptly, and strides back across the barn towards the door with Anders in tow. The large door sticks on it’s hinges and digs long-worn ditches into the dirt, creaks in protest as Fenris forces it back open, the sound of the wood scraping the floor likely enough to draw the curious on it’s own. “Run back towards the mountains.”  
With no explanation, a final glance over his shoulder towards Anders, and someone calling out all too close to the barn, he’s off on a mad dash through the tall field. Whoever had called out is now yelling, words muffled with the barn walls.

Anders takes to his heels. He hunches down as he runs, hoping the tall wheat will offer a little cover, and he does his best to follow the furrow in the grass that Fenris leaves behind. He’s lean and rested, if not well fed, but even at his best, Anders isn’t nearly as fast as the elf is. All too often, all he can see of Fenris is the swish of wheat stalks springing back into place behind him. The shouts behind him are growing a bit more distant, at least, and the line of trees at the edge of the field closer.

The farmhands turn back easily enough, their cries ever more distant once they break past the field and into the brush and tree shadow. A good sign, as far as Fenris is concerned, there was nothing to be stolen from that barn and no reason to follow unless they’d heard about a mage and an elf fleeing Kirkwall. With any luck, running back towards that very city would delay any real notice even longer.  
Now that they’re out of the mountains the plant growth is thick under the trees and largely unventured, vines thick and touch and bushes full of spines the tear at them. It slows Fenris though he keeps going with a pointed determination, and he only stops once his feet land on the shifting clicks of pebbles and a small brook stretches before them in either direction. “This will lead us to the river, eventually.”

Anders braces against a tree trunk and sucks in air. There’s sweat at his temples, on his back, mostly unnoticed. When he can finally take a deep enough breath to hold onto, he drops down beside the creek and douses his face in cold water. He pants, splutters, then finally sighs, beginning to drink with his lips to the water. When he raises his head again the ends of his hair are wet, and overall his blonde mop has reached new heights of disarray. He tries combing it back with his fingers only to encounter a snag he can’t work loose, and gives up. “What will we do when we reach the river? Continue on foot, or try a boat?”

Fenris takes a turning step to look back where they came, watches intently and pose frozen save the full and steady breaths raising his chest. The pebbles shift out from under him and a foot sinks into the water, but he pays it no mind until satisfied that nobody seems to be coming. Not yet, and while he’d rather keep moving he won’t. Not until Anders does. “I don’t know. A boat would be faster but we would be easily spotted and more predictable for an ambush.”

“But we could have a cabin. With a bed.” Anders heaves a sigh. “If only I knew an invisibility spell that could hold for more than a minute. It would be heaven. And I could -fish- all day long…” Anders kneels at the stream-bed and scoops more water to his wet mouth. Finally he rises, the knees of his pants covered in mud, his boots little better, and he starts trudging with heavy footsteps along the stream.

Fenris doesn’t hesitate, sets off immediately in Anders’ wake, a halfstep behind being at his side. “A boat grants us a cabin any moreso than walking?” Sooner, perhaps, though still.

It takes Anders a moment to realize Fenris has misunderstood him, and why. He begins to grin. “Wait, that’s what you’ve been aiming for? A cabin in the mountains? You -romantic-!” He wheels on Fenris to grab him around the waist. The kiss he gives him is not so much a kiss as a passionate, messy snog.

The small muffled sound Fenris makes emphasizes both their impact and his surprise. His hand snaps to Anders’ chest, as instinctual for Fenris as it is familiar for Anders, but instead of metal digging to clutch at clothes his fingers spread flat, tips taught enough to raise them up with a small shiver of tendons. With some reluctance it lifts away, closes into a tight fist and drops back to Fenris’ side. The kiss is no less passionate for that movement, noticeable as it was. “I couldn’t imagine many alternatives.”

“I can, and they’re all horrid.” Anders is beaming into Fenris’s face, his arms locked around the elf’s back for just a moment longer. Then he turns, marching on along the streambed with a noticeable spring in his step. “But you and me, a cabin in the mountains, maybe by a stream… Running away has never felt more like eloping.”

“The thought hadn’t occurred to me, I was too focused on keeping you well.” Fenris’ tone are as the rest of the things he has to say. Even so, this is the closest Fenris has been to his usual dry commentary.

Anders pauses to look back over his shoulder, this time far more tender than exuberant. “I don’t deserve you. But lately that only makes me all the more grateful. You are too good to me.”

“I am only as good as your words.” It sounds like some old throwaway response, probably because it is. A once long forgotten, comfortable acknowledgement, his eyes down but a small smile betraying him all the same.

“My words don’t keep me warm at night,” Anders quips back with warmth and mildness in his voice. The sun filters through full-leafed trees as they walk, splashing them with brief flickers of comfortable warmth and bathing them in deep green. Anders can almost forget how hungry, how tired he is. All that seems to matter for the moment is the sun, the shade, and his love beside him.


	61. Chapter 61

The creek gathers as they follow it, widens into something more like a river. With it the shore they follow suffers, eroded out sections of mud and silt or small walls of debris that have washed down over years and years. They slow to pick past it carefully in some hours, in others find their path easier as farmers have lined the river with bricks to prevent floods and divert small streams of it towards their fields. The space of trees between water and farm dwindles too the more waterways they come across, and while there remains enough for them to travel unnoticed the farms are in full view, and all too tempting to pick from. But they don’t. Not after that morning, though their stomachs feel emptier the farther they trudge on. Even Fenris, who has lasted so long in perfect form, begins to show the edges of weariness.  
And, at last, he comes to a halt, shifting weight in his heels, alongside where the water falls across several boulders covered in moss , and pools below before continuing on. “We can take water here, at least.”

It’s a beautiful spot, like so much of these woods, but Anders’ head is throbbing, and his stomach is so hollow it hurts. “Food,” Anders says. “We need to eat or we’ll be collapsing by nightfall.” He climbs onto one of the boulders and looks around at the riverbanks. The mud is dark and rich, and Anders spots plants he recognizes. Elfroot, sure to be handy later. Wild onions, mountain potatoes, winter cress, fiddlehead ferns. Then he glances down into the pooling water, seeing the darting shadows and shimmers of fish below the rippling surface. Anders is well aware of how Fenris feels about fish. And he is just as aware of how Fenris is likely to feel about his method for getting some onto skewers over a cookfire.  
“This is a good spot for forrage, thankfully.” Anders slides back down from his boulder perch and trudges toward the treeline. “Here, let me show you.”

With a wary, weary, glance to their surroundings Fenris unstraps and hauls the sword from his back, and sets it against an old tree trunk near him. Either he hasn’t noticed the fish or doesn’t follow the thoughts a mage has, because he takes a few slow steps after. There should be something here. Some snarking resentment at being shown anything, an ‘I know what elfroot looks like, mage.’ But there isn’t one. Only a simple, “Show me what?”

Anders brushes the elfroot plant asside, showing Fenris a scrubbier plant beside and beneath it. “This is called winter cress, the leaves are edible. And these over here are wild spring onions. They’re all over the place here, gather up a good portion of them and I’ll work on getting a fire started. This would be a damn sight easier if we had a cooking pot… should have kept that pail.” Anders sighs and pushes his tangled hair out of his eyes. 

Fenris gives a nod and turns, but pauses mid-stride, looks around their surroundings well and slow before finally looking back towards Anders. He seems somewhat reluctant to voice himself, but with a small sigh does anyway. “Even with this, there would be little more than a few handfuls between us.”

“That’s a few handfulls more than we have. I saw some burdock on the far bank, too.” Anders crouches down, gathering dry twigs for the fire. He glances up once or twice to see if Fenris actually sets to the task or not, gradually making his way towards the water’s edge. Finally, he drops his bundle of twigs and, when Fenris’s back is turned, he raises his arms, lowers his head, and sends an orb of bright fire into the river. Steam and water spray upwards from the impact, and a couple of fish land on the banks, stunned, scorched, and twitching their last.

Anders can try anything when Fenris isn’t looking but little gets past those ears, much less a sudden hissing burst of steam from the water and the quiet slapping thuds of fish hitting mud in a last ditch effort to escape the heat. He pauses at the noise, crouched and looking back over his shoulder with a small pile of green leaves and stems in hand. There’s no complaint, or grimmace, or even polite comment, just a turn to keep picking at the plants around him.

Anders blinks. There’s a strange silence hanging in the air where a stream of bitter invective was supposed to be. He watches the elf’s bent back for a moment, then wades into the water, gathering dead, floating fish in the hem of his tunic… as well as a frog or three, he isn’t feeling picky. Once he’s rounded up what looks like a more than adequate meal, he steps up onto the riverbank again, dripping wet, and sets to work lighting his twigs on fire in a far less spectacular manner. “I know you hate fish,” he says, with an odd feeling that he’s speaking more for his own sake than Fenris’s. “But I don’t think even you’re going to be able to chase down hares on an empty stomach.”

Fenris straightens, the ground around him picked of everything useful, a small pile of green in a close spread palm. What Anders ‘caught’ looks all the more welcoming, though the patch of plants he settled by was flourishing what he actually managed to gather looks far smaller when stacked flat together. Still, there remains not a single sneer or sour look towards the fish even with Anders’ apology. “Unfortunately I can’t run down a hare, regardless.”

“I’m not sure I believe that. Not that I’m asking you to prove anything.” Anders coaxes the twigs alight, and gradually adds some larger chunks of wood. He glances to Fenris again and again, having to confirm to himself that the elf isn’t so much as flaring his nostrils in disgust. Perhaps he’s hungrier than Anders thought. "If you’ll sharpen some sticks, I’ll gut the fish,“ Anders offers. He pulls a small knife from his belt for the task, something he uses when gathering herbs or cutting fresh bandages from rags. He sets to the task with slumped shoulders and his head down. The lank tangles of his hair half-hide the worry on his face.

“I assure you, it would end terribly.” Perhaps one of the Dalish could do it. But as much as he can trudge through forests of them, he can all too easily imagine hitting a tree well before a rabbit would come to any harm. Without another word for it he sets the plants near the small beginnings of a fire, and sets back to their surroundings to pick out a few sticks. Things stronger, a sight thicker than the flimsy twigs being used for the fire, pieces he breaks directly off the nearest trees when they don’t need to burn. Far easier to find what he needs, and soon enough he kneels back down as he pulls a misericord from one hip. The blade is a small, simple thing that hides well tucked under one pouch, thin with a bare handle that hardly distinguishes from the dagger save being wooden. Even as he settles into his seat on the ground he uses it with a certain careful touch, only uses the edge at the hilt to sharpen down a stick before moving to the next, less to put off sharpening it again and more to guarantee it will be sharp should he ever need it.

Anders also loses himself in his work for a time, slitting open the bellies of fishes and spilling their cold, pale guts onto the riverbank. He dimly wonders if he should be disgusted, but he’s seen more gruesome things by far. Especially in the deep roads, and occasionally things he’s managed to heal. Still, he isn’t sure "jaded” would be the word for how he feels. He can feel disgust, distaste, somewhere further back in his thoughts. He just has a reign on it. It serves no purpose, right now. As those words drift across the surface of his mind Anders glances up, watching Fenris again. He’s a slave to necessity at the moment, but Fenris?  
The work is finished quickly, at least. He carries the fish in his tunic again, well aware the garment needs to be washed or burnt at this point. He crouches next to Fenris and starts skewering the catch, driving the butt-ends of the sticks into the dirt and propping them with rocks to keep them in the heat above the fire. The smell of cooking fish flesh hits his nostrils almost immediately, and his mouth waters.

With no other work he can tend to and no knowledge of what to do with the plants he gathered, Fenris picks the flecks of bark and sap from the edge of the small blade and tucks it back to a hidden sheath strapped to his belt. Finally, as he can relax for a few moments only for a strong waft of fish to hit his nose, a heavy sigh marks his only protest to escape the smell. “You should soak your clothes.” Likely nothing to be done for the tunic without some good vinegar, but soaking it in the river overnight should take most of the smell before it can linger.

“I could stand to soak all of me,” Anders answers. Fish scales cling to his clothing and his hands, silvery flecks too moist for him to brush away. Still, at Fenris’s suggestion, Anders unbelts his tunic and pulls it off. He wraps it around a heavy rock and puts it under the water. His ribs show, as clearly as they used to when Anders stil lived in Darktown, and he has that sad, tired look to his eyes again, that hollowness in his cheeks. “How many days to reach the mountains?”

Perhaps the worst sign is that when Fenris looks up, he seems to have a moment of confusion before realizing exactly which mountains Anders means. His eyes drift back down as he thinks on it, settling on the small fire. “It depends. If we kept as we are, probably halfway in a few weeks.” Fenris pauses with that, doesn’t have to outright mention that it would be a bad idea to run them both to the bone as they are now. “I wandered, but it was some months before I reached Kirkwall.”

Anders’ slumped posture slouches a little further at that, though the mage laughs briefly. "Then is it bad that I’m this tired already?“ He works on brushing the grit off a flat rock, which he sets near the fire. They can’t do much to cook the greens but wilt them a bit, but it’s something. Then, at last, he sits down in the cold, damp dirt and rests his elbows on his thighs.

“There should be a lake within a day from here, and the river will split into the forest. We should be safer there. Even Tevinter’s slave chasers have to stick closer to the roads.” Fenris stops, again, a mix of thought and stirred memories. “Starkhaven may not be above hiring Tevinter. We should be careful once we reach Tantervale, the roads follow alongside the river and a lot of people travel them.”

"You think Sebastian would hire Tevinters?” Anders’ lip curls in disgust. "If ‘duty’ or 'the maker’ demanded it, I suppose he would think nothing of it. He hired -us-…“ Anders pulls one of the stakes from the ground, one bearing a particularly fat frog that’s begun to drip with its own juices. He hands it to Fenris. "And I always thought he liked you. Just not as much as he hates me, after what I’ve done…”


	62. Chapter 62

The flatlands of the Free Marches treat Fenris and Anders well enough. Thick sheets of clouds roll in to keep the sun off their backs, and when it peels away to clear skies a nipping breeze cools them. It hasn’t rained on them, not yet though the air seems like it might any day now, growing more stagnant in the way that clings their clothes to their backs with muggy sweat and the clouds bringing a familiar damp smell.   
Their exodus has slowed somewhat, either from exhaustion or the beginning edges of complacency from nobody noticing their path through the woods along the river. Or perhaps dinners of fish and toads begins to get old after so many days. Whatever the reason even the elf is showing signs of their trek, still keeping posture but all the more often slipping into a mindless trek of someone who no longer thinks about how many days it’s been. 

It’s been enough days that even Anders has mostly fallen silent. His weariness shows on his face, and his eyes are darkened, downcast, always watching the muddy ground in front of them. He’s had marches like this one in the past, but not quite as long, and always with shackles on his wrists. He feels their weight on the ends of his arms, enough that every now and then he raises his wrists to make sure they’re still bare. Bare, and growing bony. But they still feel heavy enough that Fenris’s back a few steps ahead seems unreachable, the effort of even trying to clasp his shoulder such an obvious waste that his gaze just slides back to the ground. The elf never gets too far ahead, even when Anders’ pace flags, yet Anders hasn’t seen anything in his eyes but stony composure when he glances back to check on him.

Almost on cue Fenris stops, so suddenly and halting that Anders nearly runs into him. After the first week it takes him longer before he turns back to face Anders, takes up his time searching the woods with his senses as if he doesn’t miss the face behind him. When he does turn it’s that same look as ever, and while it’s only the edges of evening it’s all so predictable what he intends to say. What he always ever turns to say. “We should stop here for the night. There’s a tavern along the road nearby, if you wish.”  
Even despite Anders’ best attempts the words haven’t wavered, politeness beginning to grind in their monotony and that Fenris will suggest so often but actually make choices for them so rarely. And even then, so carefully worded.

“I wish you’d stop that, is what I wish.” Anders’s tone is flat, his voice a bit rough from having been used so seldom over the past days. He comes to a halt, but he doesn’t look up. It doesn’t seem worth the effort to raise his head when he knows what he’ll see in Fenris’s face will only hurt. “I am too fucking tired, Fenris, to play at divining your wishes and intentions! Do you want to stop at the tavern or do you want to sleep on the ground? Do you want to keep going? Do you want to leave me behind like you should have back in Kirkwall instead of dragging me across the continent like some sorry sack of shit you seem to think you can’t live without? Do you?!”

There’s a long, increasingly awkward and tense silence between them at that, the words hanging in the air. Maybe Fenris won’t answer at all, if Anders told him to stop and he doesn’t seem to want to talk any other way. Maybe even better, he’ll blow up and they’ll be like they always were, settling differences with a harsh fight until they both finally lose steam.  
What actually does come is far worse. “Leaving you behind would be a poor way to serve you, ser. I only wish to take you where you want to go.” And more of the same, though with edges to it, sharp edges, biting politeness Tevinter wouldn’t retaliate against. More polite than he’s been, and purposely hurtful for it.

Anders still doesn’t raise his head, although he raises his eyes. He glares at Fenris from under knotted eyebrows. “I don’t want a servant,” he hisses. “If that’s what you are now, get out of my sight or I’ll sell you to the first person who makes me an offer.”

Fenris dips his chin an inch, his eyes dropping farther and out of Anders’ glare. “If that is what you want. I would be more benefit to you to stay, the coin would provide you food and horses.”

“What do you care?!” Anders raises his voice. Pain draws deeper furrows in his face, a few hot tears brimming in his eyes. “I’m a burden to you now – one you carry at arm’s length. Is this some kind of punishment? I’ve killed our love but you’re making sure I live long enough to mourn it?” He watches Fenris’s face, turned away and half hidden under his silver hair, and finally slumps to the muddy ground, sitting on his heels. “It’s no use, is it.”

The controlled fall doesn’t drag Fenris’ eyes down with it, gaze now trailing the air above Anders’ hair. “I don’t want you to mourn anything. If I wanted you to die I would have tried.”

“/Stop it!/”

Another pause, and Fenris finally looks like he has some sort of emotion beyond strict pleasantries, shoulders falling and hair brushing forward as his head drops to stare at the dirt at his feet. That he’s failed. And, finally, meekly, “Tell me what you want.”

“I want you with me. I want to know why you’re acting this way, I want you to know… I will never think of you as a servant, I will never think of you as someone -lesser-. I want you back the way you were, I want a safe place to hold you and a chicken dinner and a bath.” Anders sobs as he speaks, dragging dirty, calloused hands over his sunken eyes and leaving muddy streaks on his cheeks.

Fenris sinks to the ground, one knee crumpling to a kneel, then the other, arms slack at his sides. A good show of humility and wanting forgiveness if Anders weren’t down here already. “I can’t. It won’t work.”

“Why? Can you at least tell me why?” Anders gazes at Fenris with reddened eyes. He reaches for him, offering an embrace but not forcing one. “Even if it’s all my fault, I need to know.” And yet his chin tightens and his lip quivers as he tries to force some measure of composure.

Even before Anders touches him Fenris lists, just a little, a shift of weight towards the offering almost unconsciously. He doesn’t look up, though his expression towards the ground changes a bit, perplexed to explain something he sees as so obvious. Maybe Anders just wants to hear it from him. “There is only one way this will end. The mages will leave the circle. Tevinter will offer support.”

Anders pulls Fenris into his arms then, wrapping in the tightest hug he can muster. His impulse is to argue, but instead he holds his tongue. He thinks. True or not, this is what Fenris believes. This is why he’s been so distant, formal… subservient. “You think slavery is the only place that will be left for you then,” he says.

While Fenris doesn’t return the hug he leans against it, head propped to Anders’ shoulder for more support than he knew he wanted. “No. The only place to stay at your side.”

“Do you know how much I love you?” Anders whispers hoarsely against Fenris’s ear. The question is genuine. “Have you forgotten?”

“You don’t know how much Thedas will change.” In some way, at least Fenris believes what happened in Kirkwall will start something, instead of branding Anders a crazed apostate whose name will fizzle out with time. It’s only that he believes the wrong thing, that the only way mages can be free is if the world follows Tevinter’s footsteps.

“Neither do you.” Anders pulls back enough to look Fenris in the eyes. “And if we even make it to where we’re going, I don’t plan to ever leave. The rest of my life belongs to you. /I/ will always be by /your/ side. Do you understand this?”

If Fenris has any complaints he doesn’t air them, instead just finally looks up. His eyes aren’t meek, only exhausted, far more than he’s ever looked. “If that’s what you want. I will always be at your side.”

Anders tightens his hug again, tucking Fenris’s head under his chin. His beard is growing in, bushy and tangled, and it scratches against Fenris’s scalp. With both of them tired and his own nerves ragged and raw, it doesn’t seem like the time to press. At least now he knows. “Let’s go to the tavern you mentioned. We need a meal and a bed.”

Fenris gives a small nod, the barest curt movement against Anders’ chin before he leans back on his heels to separate them and stand. Yet even with that discussion well out of the way, the best response he can give is a halting, "As-…/yes/.” With it his shoulders fall, brows furrowing as he glares off at nothing. Frustrated. When he starts again, his voice is lower. “We should do something about my hair. People are going to begin to notice me.”

“I’ll craft you a wig out of my beard,” Anders says dryly. He stands as well, and for all the ravages of hunger and exhaustion on his face, his eyes look calm. “We need some supplies. May as well see if we can get them at this tavern.” Anders plucks at his tunic. Dirty, threadbare, and starting to come apart at the seams, it clearly isn’t going to last much longer at all.

At least there’s a firm exhale at that comment, not quite an exasperated sigh and far from a familiar snippy response, but a quiet sound that wants to be one of those things. Fenris is troubled, clearly so, enough that any bare attempts at humor only bother the point. “The tavern is this way. We can get supplies in the morning.”

“Fenris,” Anders says. “You’re not alone this time.” Though with how much he feels like a hindrance, Anders isn’t sure how reassuring he can manage to be. He shoulders his staff and steps closer, eyes in the direction Fenris had indicated the road and the tavern would be.

“I’m not, but we have more than slavers after a bounty this time.” Finally Fenris turns to look at Anders, but only to drive his point home, expression sharp and solemn. “The towns are going to side with Starkhaven and the Chantry. This will be far harder than what I faced, with less coin in our pockets.” But before Anders can rally a reply he turns away and sets off in the direction of the tavern, intent to get there before the evening crowd sets in. The one he knows, the one that always gets drunk, confrontational and remembers every new face walking in.


	63. Chapter 63

The tavern Fenris mentioned is an old stone building on the outskirts of a small village, one that reminds Anders at a glance of where he grew up. They arrive not long after sundown, on what looks to be the earlier end of the evening crowd. The innkeep gives Fenris a bit of a narrow-eyed stare before handing over an old, dull key and waving them both upstairs. Anders isn’t sure whether it’s recognition, or more generalized suspicion. When the door to their room swings shut behind them on groaning hinges, he sits down heavily on the bed. “If they’re going to remember us anyway, perhaps I should cut some purses after all,” he mutters.

The sword is set down first, the wood floor too stained and rough to mind where the edge lands as Fenris props it nearby, and sets to working off his armor where dirt and sweat has begun to itch underneath. “If you think it best.” The sentence is, of course, toned with such a formality that he doesn’t even have to say what he actually thinks.

“No,” Anders says. He peels off his tunic and lays down on his side, back to the room. “What I think is best is you taking my head to Starkhaven.”

The remnants of Fenris’ clothes go next, unceremoniously dumped to a pile like the dirt they’re filthy with, and he sits to the edge of the bed with his elbows to his knees and a palm to a sore shoulder. Even if they’re stormed in the middle of the night, he trusts he can find better clothes on a line than what they’ve got now. At least the room has a lock to it, this time. “I don’t think that would end the way you’d hope, unless you want me to join you.”

“Then find Isabela. Live free, forget us and the mess we’ve made of your life.” Anders feels the mattress shift, and he rolls enough to look up at Fenris’s weary face. His lips compress in a tight frown and he forces himself to sit up again, reaching for the shoulder Fenris is rubbing with his hand. “I can tend that if you’ll let me.”

Fenris can’t complain about such an offer, part of him wouldn’t even mind, but even with how weary they are it doesn’t stop him from flinching his shoulder away. “And then what?”

“And then be happy. Have prodigious amounts of sex with the voluptuous pirate captain.” Anders doesn’t let the flinch discourage him. His hands rest on Fenris’s shoulder, magic spreading through his muscles in throbs of soothing warmth.

There’s no further pull to move away, no jerk out of Anders’ hands the moment the most important work and the worst of the ache is past. Fenris just watches his shoulder warily as if expecting it to change somehow. “Why do you think that would make me happy?”

“I know that being a slave won’t make you happy.” Anders lets his magic recede and trails off. His arms slip around Fenris, his chin rests on Fenris’s shoulder. “…Even mine,” he finally concludes.

Fenris huffs as he turns his chin away, gaze ignoring the hands around his waist to find nothing in particular along the floor. “I would rather be a slave than be chased down as one again. Isabela doesn’t need someone else deciding her path.” Even if they’ve discussed the issue, made clear that Anders didn’t intend what Fenris sees of the future, Fenris still believes it will happen all the same. Which means a stronger Tevinter, with more slave traders to hunt him down if someone doesn’t at least play at owning him. “I.. I can’t. I won’t do it again.”

“We won’t let it happen. We will never let you be taken from us.” Anders’s loose embrace tightens, but gently, and he turns his head to bury his nose in Fenris’s hair. Again, that “we”, and the almost imperceptible echo that comes with it. “Not as long as this is where you wish to be.”

“It won’t happen, as long as I draw breath.” Normally there would be some grim determination in those words, some clear though left unspoken swear that he’d protect Anders to his last, but now only a calm affirmation. Those feelings were a declaration once, and are no less powerful now for how comfortable they’ve gotten. “But I suspect you won’t have to, given time.”

Fenris’s words sink in. It finally dawns on Anders how much it means, that Fenris would rather be with him and playing the slave than be free and without him. He feels his throat draw tight, but he manages to swallow against it. “W– I’m not sure I deserve you. But I’m grateful all the same.”

Fenris finally tips his chin up, his temple to one side to lean his head against Anders without directly turning to look at him. Under the embrace he takes a deep breath and sighs it all out, not blissful but perhaps content for just long enough to stop worrying if someone’s going to be trying to bash in the door at any moment. “I don’t think it’s about deserving. You shouldn’t worry about it.”

“I’m… not. I’m not worrying, for once.” Anders sighs against Fenris’s neck, sharing in that contentment. His hands stroke Fenris’s belly, up to the start of his ribs where he can feel how much closer to the surface the bones are. He knows he isn’t doing any better, himself. They need a meal, but he’s reluctant to end this moment of respite.

The moment is all too short. Not because anyone bashes through the door, no their hunger getting the better of them. Because some lingering feeling passes in Fenris, and once it fades he lifts his head. In such subtle movements his shoulder is less propping Anders up and more squaring off against the weight. “We should bathe tonight while we can, and leave the tavern at dawn. Farms will be awake for bartering at that hour.”

Anders shifts away from Fenris, sitting up again, slumped against his knees. “Very well. I’ve got some elfroot, a few vials of elixirs still left. It might be worth something to someone. Hopefully they don’t take one look at me and realize I’d trade it all for a decent shave.”

Fenris looks back over his shoulder, skipping past Anders’ eyes to glance over his features. “I do have a knife…” A poor excuse for a shave, perhaps, but maybe better than none at all.

Anders smiles behind his whiskers. “I’ll give it a try. Where’s the bath?”

For a brief moment, he pauses, leafing through old memories years ago, tracking through here and cleaning more mud caked to him than there is now. “There should be a large bath behind the tavern. They keep one wall against the kitchen fireplace so we don’t need to tell them we need to use it.” And frankly, the less they talk to anyone the better as far as Fenris is concerned.

Anders rises to his feet, not bothering to pull his tunic back on before he puts his hand on the door latch. “A -warm- bath, even? I can’t get there fast enough, let’s go.”

“Then I should have mentioned it sooner.” Fenris follows suit, stands but stops. He reaches for the shirt Anders passed, loosely pulls it on without bothering to check how much it actually covers him. As long as it covers the scars until they get to the bath. “I doubt we’ll be interrupted. Last I was here, it was rarely used by anyone else.”

“Good,” Anders says, pausing to give Fenris a leisurely, unabashedly suggestive looking-over. He follows Fenris down the steps, slumping again like a travel-weary porter, thankful that the stairs don’t open onto the inn’s commonroom. The bathing shed is built onto the back of the tavern building, just as Fenris remembered. It isn’t exactly steaming warm, but it’s warm enough, and the tepid water is clean.

The moment they close the door to the shed, Fenris strips what remains of his clothes. The room is dark but enough to see by, the only light coming from thin slats high in the wall to the kitchen. While the water isn’t perfect the the bath is wide and deep, enough for several people and for the water to last before the place needs scrubbing. The stonework itself is hotter than the water, radiating heat from the fire. Fenris is quick to settle his shoulders against the soothing wall, the thin blade the only thing he’s brought with him.

Anders strips along with Fenris, tossing his trousers into the corner with Fenris’s clothing. He steps into the bath with a sigh, nearly a moan of relaxation, and leans against those same warm stones, sliding down. He holds out his hand for the knife Fenris offered and begins to carefully scrape away at the bristles of his beard. The shave is as close and smooth as his own razor would manage – Fenris keeps his blades that sharp, for which Anders is grateful.

Fenris for his part doesn’t bother scrubbing, or working knots out of his back, or doing anything in particular beyond letting his muscles melt against the hot stone surface. For a few long moments he stays there, motionless and eyes closed, and looks quite contently asleep while Anders carefully picks the knife around the details of his jaw. It would be a nice sight, if he had any energy at all to watch.  
“How was it, when you were alone in Ferelden?”

Anders pauses in his shaving, closing his eyes and letting out a sigh. “Lean times, and lonely. I never knew who I could trust. Had a little more coin than this, usually, but not much.” The scrape of the blade against his neck and chin resumes, coarse hair falling into the tub.

“I imagine we will be leaner still before we’re used to this.” If there is any such thing as ‘getting used to’ being on the run from at least one entire country. They have yet to pass Tevinter, and while Fenris noticed nobody else chasing after him once Danarius was dead, he wondered if friends of the magister had put out more casual warrants for an elf’s capture or death. The man had been somewhat popular and a well respected figure for his work, after all. Missed.  
It all boiled down to how easy Fenris was to identify. It made him a liability for both of them, and it’s the thought that weighs his shoulders and brows heavy. “How fast did the templars find you?”

“The longest I ever stayed free was about eighteen months I spent in Amaranthine. I was doing work for the city’s thieves’ guild… think I mentioned that to you once. They had a lot of bolt-holes and let me use them.” Anders scrapes away more of his beard and runs a hand across his shaven face. A few more careful passes cleans away what he missed, and he hands the knife back to Fenris. “When the Templars figured out how I kept eluding them when they had my phylactery, they talked to the guild. Guild turned me in.”

This is easier, distracting himself with things he should pay attention to rather than facts about himself he can’t change. “Mm. It still seems strange, hearing about Templars that mean something. I’ve seen it firsthand for years now and they still seem nothing like the ones in Tevinter.”

“The situation is different here. In Tevinter, being a mage is synonymous with being nobility. In the rest of southern Thedas, we’re nothing but commoners with a dangerous curse.” It’s ground they’ve covered before, but Anders doesn’t mind. Just to be speaking to Fenris feels as much a pleasant luxury as the bath and the fresh shave. “In Tevinter, the templars are accountable to magistocracy, and here, they’re accountable to the Chantry. The main thing in common, I’m guessing, is that both are armies of trained thugs to support their masters’ agenda. Whether spells or swords or both, a person’s life shouldn’t be fettered with fear.” His voice takes on a sort of confidence and a subtle resonance.

“True enough.” Fenris pauses, if only to finally crack his eyes open to watch Anders. The light, or what little there is of it, hits the far wall and diffuses against the freshly shaved features in a flattering sort of way. If only they had the coin to spare for wine. “I’ve heard many consider the Templars in Tevinter rather toothless, ruled by mages to police mages.”

“And here they’re ruled by mage-haters to jail us and execute us – and I’ll admit, they do very well at that. You would think somebody would’ve found some happy medium between the two by now.” Anders takes a deep breath and slides under the water, coming up with his hair pushed back and dripping. He reaches for the thin chip of soap still left in the bath and begins to scrub, eager to get as much dirt and sweat off his skin as he can. He notices Fenris watching him, and meets his gaze with a small, inviting smile.

“It isn’t true.” Fenris drops his gaze down to the bath, though not demurely so, leans forward until his elbows sink against his knees with a slow wave through the water. “The Templars in Tevinter. It’s just that crimes are only crimes when committed against other mages.” Human mages, he should add. Mages high enough for the Black Divine to mind.

“That is still scarcely justice.” It’s disorienting, feeling Justice push forward, while Anders, in the middle of casting a long, familiar gaze on Fenris’s body, has completely different things on his mind. There’s a moment of inward push and pull between them, Anders griping about having to forego a very promising hard-on but stepping back at last, surprised by a note of meekness from the spirit.  
“If what you say does come to pass, I will fight the Magisters. I will not sit idly by and let my work be perverted by slave-mongers and blood mages. You have seen what I am capable of. I would bring far greater wrath down upon these mages who would be masters to the world of mortals.”

There’s a quick, strong huff from Fenris at that, an emotional mix of thinly veiled irritation and a cracking, humorless laugh. Still doesn’t look up, though his brows knit. He can’t, now. "I think you have done enough, demon.“

You told me to know my place,” Justice says. “If I cannot lend my strength to change this world, I have no purpose here. No place.” His voice lowers to a hoarse murmur. “You wish me gone.”

“/No/-” Then, quieter, the immediate answer too sharp and Fenris pausing to cool his mind from how raw it’s been feeling towards Justice lately, “…no. I only wish you were less ambitious. I can’t do this again. /I can’t./”

Justice is silent for a moment, gazing at Fenris’s bowed head as he considers. “I sacrificed much. More than was my right. I carry a burden of guilt, and I do not know how to allay it. I do not know if that is even possible. A friend said to me once that if I gave more than I took from my host, I would be no demon. But I have taken too much from Anders, and from you. I have become a demon in truth.” Blue light from his eyes glints on the trail a tear makes down his cheek. “I do not know what my place should be, now, or what use I am to anyone. I have never wholly understood how Anders can loathe himself… until now.”

Fenris swallows, silent a few moments more as Justice’s blue glow mixes evenly with the light from the kitchen and casts reflections across the water. His words had sparked a place in him that he’s been burying this entire time, and once he composes himself somewhat he tries to distract the topic to something he can handle cleanly. “Do you think any of us have a use?”

“I… no, but you are not spirits. A mortal is… I have only…” Justice gives up with a frustrated sigh. “I do not understand.”

“I think I understand. To feel suddenly without purpose and of very little use to anyone, if not a burden entirely.”

Justice nods minutely. “Perhaps worse than a burden. Perhaps even malign, no matter my intentions. How may I be anything else? I… cannot trust my own judgment.”

“I felt the way you do for a very long time. At times I still do. You will drive yourself to madness if you focus on it for too long.”

“What am I to do instead?” Justice raises his head, the cold glow of his eyes fixed on Fenris, beseeching.

Fenris smiles a tiny quirk to one corner of his lips. “Perhaps I wouldn’t be the best to answer that. I took up drinking heavily.”

“Anders has… suggestions.” Justice’s voice has a sort of fond frustration in its tone. He glances aside, but when he looks back to Fenris, he tilts his head. "You do not despise me.“

"As much as I should.. no.” In fact Fenris has grown oddly comfortable with Justice around, though he feels odd admitting it even to himself, or excuses it off as just feeling familiar.

“We are grateful. Grateful for your presence, and that you speak to me as a friend would. In spite of everything, you still find kindness within yourself. Perhaps… this is the way I should look to your example.”

“I can’t afford not to be, demon.” But it’s a weak grumble at worst. “That is an equally terrible idea.”

“Then I shall endeavor to find a better one, somehow.” Justice speaks with fondness, and a touch of wryness he’s picked up from Anders. From the look on his face, however, he understands the sentiment behind that grumbling reply. Even though the glow in his eyes fades, the tenderness in his, in Anders’ expression, remains.

Fenris finally looks up as the light fades, though manages to not directly look their way. With a sigh and a sudden wave of self consciousness he drops his chin to the heel of one palm. Even living with them all this time, it’s too easy for Fenris to forget there’s a good chance the other can hear the conversation. “Be sure not to encourage him.”

“Encourage him in what, exactly? Adoring you?” Anders smiles a slanted smile, crawling closer in the bath.

It can’t be that the movement goes unnoticed, little waves of water licking at Fenris’ shoulder, but he at least pretends not to notice. “That, though I meant choosing impossible tasks.”

“He’s minding your advice,” Anders says. “Yours and mine. He’ll be content with keeping you safe.” Anders reaches out, his fingertips touching Fenris’s chin, just a gentle nudge to coax his head to turn.

He does, easily, eyes falling into Anders’ gaze with that smallest request. “I don’t need to be kept safe.”

“What do you need?” Anders’ face is so close to his, eyes part lidded and his voice a husky whisper.

Fenris’ eyelids fall, though only in thought, and when they open again his gaze is turned down. “I don’t want to be the reason you’re captured.” While valid, that’s too immediate, and not all of it. After a moment he winces as he forces himself to add, “I want to trust you like I used to.”

That gets a heavy sigh from Anders, and he leans his forehead against Fenris’s for a moment before he settles back. “I want to deserve that trust again. It will take time to mend, if it ever does. I am so sorry.” He bows his head. In his mind those words of apology are like a litany, ever repeating, even in his sleep.

When Fenris looks back up there’s a wary glint to his eyes that hadn’t been there before. Or perhaps was, only deeply buried until now. “How do I know you won’t lie again?”

Anders forces himself to meet Fenris’s eyes. “I want to tell you… so many things. Because you are the only thing I want in this world. Because I know the consequences now are too much to bear. Because it’s out of my system, it’s done. But … you won’t know. My words are worth so little, now.”

“What did you expect?” The words somehow sound like they should be screaming, should be angry, and full of pain. But they’re not, either from Fenris hiding it or being simply too tired with the lot of it. Maybe both. “What did you think would happen when I realized?”

“I thought I would be dead soon after.” Anders’ voice is quiet, but cracking under the weight of regret. “I thought… it was selfish of me to put my own wishes ahead of what… what I thought the world, and mages, and all those who died in the Underground, needed of me. That I had to pay the price.”

That answer gives Fenris pause, but not for long. “How would your death have made that you lied any easier?”

“I would have paid a price for it,” Anders answers weakly. He hangs his head. “It would have made it easier for -me-, I suppose. Not to have to live with what I’ve done to you.”

“I… see.” Which really means Fenris doesn’t see at all, can only look down into the water and the stonework below. “I didn’t know you were so ready to leave.”

“I wasn’t.” Anders can feel a lump rising in his throat again. “I wasn’t ready at all. You remember the days that led up to it. You remember how I was. Maker, it was too hard… It was like tearing my own heart out.”

Fenris doesn’t respond to that. Perhaps he just has no response. What could he say that isn’t a moot point now. It’s been done. He could be angry, he could leave, but it would change nothing and only lead to things he’d regret.  
It isn’t his place to do any of those things, anyway.  
The sounds of metal pans clanging together in the kitchen behind him catches his attention from the black pool of his thoughts, and he half turns his head to look back as if he could see through the wall. After a moment of stillness his chin tips back towards the door and he stands, water falling from his body in a small ruckus of splashes and ripples. “Most of the inn has eaten if they’re cleaning the kitchen. We should go before anyone notices us.”

“I am so sorry.” Anders repeats, hushed and head bowed. He answers Fenris’s words only by standing and stepping out of the bath, reaching for his clothes, not at all acting like he can occupy the ‘place’ where Fenris puts him.

“It doesn’t matter.” At first the reply sounds polite but really only matter-of-fact. It’s true enough, and Fenris doesn’t seem any more or less bothered by it. Maybe he’s just tired of Anders saying it. He runs both hands across his scalp, pulling as much water out as he can before giving a small shake of his head and reaching to pull his clothes on. The tunic he’s thrown on and his smalls are one thing but his pants are another entirely, tricky to pull on with his skin this wet, and it takes some pulling before they settle into place. “I’ll get food from the kitchen for us.”

“Yes it does.” Anders says the words, so very softly, as Fenris walks away. Softly enough he doesn’t seem to think Fenris could hear. He turns away, heading indoors, heading for the stairs back to their room, not especially taking notice as his tunic soaks up the water dripping from his hair.

If Fenris heard it he doesn’t miss a step, straightening and squaring off his shoulders as he walks into the main area of the tavern. It isn’t a formal look he ever seemed to use for all those years in Kirkwall but he looks at home with it, easily confident despite the ears and being so memorably different. Even with a piece of Anders’ worn thin, stained clothing it’s all too easy to imagine a magister at his side.   
Soon enough he returns to the room, a thick wooden bowl in each hand. The contents are somewhat meager, soup mostly broth and a chunk of bread, but it’s hot and a better meal they’ve had in some days. “Fortunately, the innkeeper hates mages as much as she recognizes me.”

Anders chuckles at that, even if dryly. He takes the bowl with gratitude and he puts the rim to his lip, sipping the broth. He can feel warmth spreading out from the pit of his stomach almost immediately, and it’s comforting. "Thank you,“ he says, offering a small smile, uncertain but tender.

Fenris settles at Anders’ side, and pushes his section of bread farther into the broth before pulling it out, golden-soaked and dripping, to take a large bite. Even if he had to play at Tevinter manners moments ago, hunger is paining him too much to care now. “This isn’t good. I’ve been on this road before, she won’t be the only one to recognize me.”

"Then we need to do our trading and get off the road. Or we need horses so we can move faster.” Anders suspects, though, that Fenris already has ideas of his own. He sops up broth with his bread as well, but eats tidily if only for not wanting to lose a single drop.

Though perhaps not, the way Fenris looks a bit troubled, brows knitting as he gulps down the contents of his bowl with little savoring. “I’m not sure we can afford horses. Even if we steal them, that’s a town angry with us and two more bodies we need to care for.”

“Then we’ll have to stay off the roads from here as much as we can.” Anders finishes his bread and wishes there were more. They could ambush some travelers, steal their horses and supplies like common bandits, but Anders doesn’t want that much more blood on his hands. If they stumble upon any who try and fight them -first- however, it would almost be a stroke of luck.

Fenris’ head dips, and he sets down the empty bowl to the one table in the room alongside the bed. “That’s easy enough to say. I can’t guarantee remembering everyone who’s seen me.” He cracks a humorless grin, at that. “Perhaps you /should/ trade me for a horse, you would be better off.”

“That would be a tad idiotic, trading my reason for living for the means to keep living.”

“Does that mean you have a better plan?”

“Yes. Holding onto you for dear life.”

Fenris sighs at that, too tired to even try to hide it, and drops onto his back with closed eyes. He might be in damp pants, a loose tunic and sideways on the bed, but he can imagine just falling asleep this way. Asleep and full of guilt. “We may not live very long.”

“I’m surprised I’ve lived this long already.” Anders finishes his soup, even licking the bottom of the bowl. “And I owe you for it more than once.” He sets his empty bowl aside and turns his body towards Fenris. “Is it really such a surprise that I have so much faith in you?”

He doesn’t even open his eyes at that, though he feels the momentary weight shift in the bed, for Anders to set the bowl on the table, and for the warmth of a body somewhat closer. “Regardless of my skills at killing others, I would rather not die knowing my hair and skin killed us.”

“It … ” Anders is also nodding, his belly full, and his body warm for a welcome change. “I can do something about your hair, if you want.” Something that’s crossed his mind in the past and filters into his consciousness again.

Fenris sits up with a jolt, eyes wide and a barely quelled outburst that Anders hadn’t realized this sooner. The best that sputters out of him, instead, is a stunned and sharp, “What!?”

Anders’ cheeks redden and his gaze darts away. He isn’t sure why he hadn’t realized this sooner, either, and he’s ashamed. “I remember once you… wondered aloud what color your hair used to be. I can change it back. It will probably only last until the next time you use your lyrium. I didn’t bring it up before because… I didn’t think you’d like me using magic on you frivolously.”

The initial surprise softens as Fenris’ mind quiets and thinks it over. Anders is right, if he had mentioned it before Fenris would have blown him off. Not just because of the magic, but the fact that it would be confronting something he isn’t sure he wants to think about, every moment he wakes up until the deep evening when colors no longer matter. But now, head bowing to look down at the bed itself and make his final choice, he nods. This is more important than being scared of a past that can’t hurt him as well as a Templar’s sword can. “Do it, then.”

“As you wish.” It isn’t even intentional as Anders echoes Fenris’s own so-common words back to him. He reaches for him, the movement slow, bringing his hand to rest on the side of Fenris’s face. It’s an affectionate touch, deeply tender, and the flow of his magis is equally gentle. It slips under Fenris’s skin, under his scalp, raising goosebumps, making his hair lift like a trickling current of lightning. And then, from the roots, color creeps along each fine, white hair.

The goosebumps send a shiver down Fenris’ spine, a drop of ice down his back that leaves him cold and robs him of any confidence he had. His eyes go wide again but this time unsure, his lips parting to tell Anders to stop as his gaze shoots upward. The words fall silent before they even leave him, strands of hair now in view between them and the familiar white drowning with a deep, rich color. Fenris claps his hand to Anders’, clutches to it. For a few moments he freezes, expecting some horrible memory to stab through him, but in the end he’s left with an uneasy breath and hair the color of dark, sun dried peppers.

Anders’ own eyes are wide with fascination at the change. He marvels for a quiet moment, letting his hand stay where Fenris holds it, reaching out to rest his other hand on Fenris’s knee. He smiles tentatively. “…I /knew/ you were a ginger.”

The moment of small terror fades with that, and Fenris’ face screws with ill humor as he drops his head again. It only serves to better show off the new color, and the sudden shift combs their fingers into the midst of it. He grumbles, “You had doubts, after seeing my sister?”

“Between your sister and your temper? No doubts at all.” Anders curls his fingers against Fenris’s scalp, gently scratching as he begins to grin. “It’s striking,” he says.

Fenris’ hand loosens and drops from Anders’ knuckles, though he does nothing to pull away from the grasp. “Only because you haven’t seen it before.” But it is, enough that Fenris is forgetting his self-imposed politeness, and not as if he remembers it himself.

“Oh, of course,” Anders deadpans. “I’m sure I'l become just as jaded to your looks as I was before, given time.” He leans closer, until their foreheads almost touch, and then, finally, their lips do.

Fenris lets his eyes drop closed, just barely leans into the touch but does all the same, and for a moment just tries to forget everything that has happened or might happen. He does pull away, predictably, but even then it feels like he’s forcing himself to. “We should sleep while we have a bed.” At that he stands, if only to keep Anders from kissing him again for a moment while he pulls off his pants, clothes still somewhat damp from the bath. As long as they’re dry by morning.

Fenris’s gambit only sort of works. Anders ends up kissing his hip as Fenris slides his pants down, but beyond that he behaves. He sheds his own clothes. Not willing to stand up to get his pants off, he just plants his shoulders on the bed and arches his body upward, making for a bit of a display as he shimmies the tight fabric down his thighs. “You’re right of course,” he says, even though his tired eyes still smolder.

Beyond a small puff at being kissed Fenris doesn’t respond, just lays his pants out flat along the floor and crawls back onto the mattress, burrowing under the covers as he does. With the moment of fear that his memories will haunt him aside, exhaustion is finally taking over. “Merely observing.”

Anders snuffs the lamp in the room with just a dab of magic, sliding up against Fenris, draping his arm across his lover’s body to urge him close. “Of course, ser,” he says silkily, even as he lets his eyes drift shut.


	64. Chapter 64

The sun is far too low on the horizon when Fenris shifts in bed, sinking closer along Anders’ skin before his eyes crack open. As he sits up a knuckle raises with him to rub at his eyelids, sore and begging for more sleep, and once they clear he scowls at the small shocks of red hair along the top edge of his vision. Something about it bothers him, regardless of how grateful he is or how useful it should prove to be. With a small puff of a sigh he shoves it from his mind, and turns to rest a hand along Anders’ shoulder. “We should leave before anyone notices me.”

Anders stirs only grudgingly, looking at Fenris with deeply shadowed eyes. “No one’s going to notice you in here. We have these things called walls and doors,” he grumbles. He does roll over, though, bringing himself face to face with his lover and draping an arm over him.

“Not in here, but I imagine the innkeeper would notice I look rather different if she remembered me after all those years.” But the protest from Fenris is quiet and while he doesn’t fall back to bed, he does lean against a palm and looks decidedly heavy on his bones. “Would you rather sleep until Sebastian finds you?”

“Sebastian can go fall into a broodmother’s spawning pit and stay there praying to his fancy fucking belt-buckle for deliverance, for all…” Anders’s grumbling trails off into incomprehensible muttering as he pushes himself upright. His head is throbbing, and the most he can do right now is pull a couple of elfroot leaves from the pouch on his belt and chew them. He starts pulling his clothes on, weary and aching, but stronger for having rested the day.

Despite the fact Fenris started this, he seems no faster at dragging his clothes on this morning. “You can sleep as long as you like tonight as long as we don’t light a fire, the woods are going to start getting thicker.” Then, in a pause as he reaches for his armor, “Fall into what?”

“A broodmother’s spawning pit,” Anders repeats. He wraps his belt around his waist and starts tugging his boots on. "I’d describe one to you but take it from me, you don’t really want to know.“

“I suppose not. At least, not this early in the morning.” If it’s too early to drink it’s too early to discuss what horrors Anders has seen in his lifetime, nevermind the fact that they don’t have a drop of alcohol between them. “Perhaps tonight. I imagine there will be plenty of bored nights once we leave light and an easy bed.”

"I’m not sure I’ll like telling that story in the dark, either,” Anders sighs. "But then, when would I,“ he finishes. He’s standing and shouldering his staff in short order, holding out a hand to Fenris. Given the moment to pause, he just takes in the sight of the man who’s stayed beside him. He smiles, tired but so deeply fond. "I’m sure we can find things to do together at night.”

And finally, a small huff from Fenris with an equally small smirk tugging at the corners of his otherwise cool expression. As soon as he realizes it he glances downward with a meek cough, and heads for the door to pick up his sword and sling it over his shoulder. “We should move on.”

Anders just gives him an assenting “Mmm.” For a moment his hand rests on Fenris’s shoulder. It isn’t a kiss, but for now it will have to do.

The inn hallway seems quiet enough, nobody else stirring in their beds or already left yet earlier in the morning. As they pass a door Fenris dips to pick up a piece of laundry that had been left by the door. The thing is still dirty, less a cloak and more a large, dusty brown rag with tattered edges, but it does well enough to cover the scars along his neck and chin as he loosely wraps it.

Anders follows a few steps behind. On their way out he grabs a wool cloak from one of the coat pegs, forgotten there by some tavern patron. He fastens it around his shoulders, grateful for one less thing they’ll need to trade for.


	65. Chapter 65

For once it feels like they may have done something right for a change. The day is cloudy but not damp, and at most threatens a short breeze to pick at their cloaks and bundles. Despite Fenris’ initial hesitation to the idea they stay on the roads in the morning, needing food with what little coin they’ve kept this far.  
And nobody notices them. Just a wandering man and an elf, distinctly one before the other as Fenris immediately drops the act he kept up in the inn and just this once relents to something lower, more elf-like and a step behind Anders. At least his slouch seems familiar, and he can’t hide the confident walk as much as he tries.  
Perhaps even more surprisingly, someone takes pity on them. Perhaps Anders looks too thin in his clothes, or the soft hints of rings under their eyes, or perhaps that a man just shouldn’t be as thin as an elf if not thinner. When they stop to ask a woman working a small farm if she has anything they could buy, she sends them off with almost too much to carry; most of it dried and preserved for their journey, and staling bread. It’s enough to leave the road with, with some coin still in their pockets. They lie, say that they’re headed to Ansburg for work and a new life. She smiles and believes it, and honestly the lie is close enough. Just in the opposite direction.  
Finally the sun sets, when it rose too early to begin with, and with the clouds overhead the night is too hot to light a campfire. Instead they sit in the fading light, shoulders together, crunching crusts to finish off the old bread before it gets older and not a complaint between them about it.

With sundown comes the chatter of frogs and night insects, and the forest comes alive all around them. Watching the fading orange light of the sunset and feeling, for a welcome change, sated to the point of drowsiness, Anders leans against Fenris and licks breadcrumbs from his hands. Bless that woman, he thinks for the hundredth time. Kindness had been the last thing he’d expected. He still imagines that somehow his stigma is visible to everyone who looks his way. Mage, apostate, deserter, abomination, renegade, murderer.

After they’d left the road Fenris had gotten quieter, not that he was ever talkative to begin with, but at least now he stands just a little taller. Even now, he sits a little straighter, a warm statue for Anders to lean on as he finishes his last few bites of bread. If only they had wine to wash it down with. Even cheap wine, the unbearable slave wines in Tevinter that were always sour and did little more than get one drunk in short order, and perhaps a bit sick on the way. “You didn’t explain this ‘spawning pit’.”

“It is what it sounds like. It’s where little Darkspawn come from,” Anders says glibly. “I’ve seen one once. The Warden Commander in Amaranthine told me about another.” Even without wine, or a fire, Anders feels surprisingly content. Yet he takes a deep breath, his expression turning serious as he thinks of how to relate what Fenris is asking him. Anyone else, the glib answer would be enough.  
“You remember the Deep Roads. That’s where they keep the broodmothers, where they’re safe and guarded. When the Darkspawn kidnap women, it’s to make broodmothers of them. They force-feed them human flesh and rot, glut them on it and rape them until their bodies swell with corruption. The women lose their minds, they change. They… become their own nest, tumorous flesh growing into the walls and the floor and they’re rooted there, enormous, bloated, bellies swollen with their brood. They have tentacles that weave through it all like veins, and that’s how they defend themselves from intruders. They’re a living nightmare, even more so than any other darkspawn. Even if the Commander hadn’t told me how they’re born, I would’ve known just looking at her. They’re the embodiment of the torment that creates them.”

Fenris listens, chin turned towards Anders to watch him in the last remnants of sunlight, never once balks. Even still, when Anders finishes the best he initially sums up is a blank, “Oh.” that fades into a troubled hum. Then, after a moment he gathers himself for a better response. Before he tries to imagine what Anders was describing again. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have asked. You didn’t need to recall that.”

Anders shrugs, his expression mild. “I will, whether anyone asks me or not. But.. it was seeing the Mother that made me understand the Wardens, truly. They’re ruthless. But when it’s in the name of trying to keep -that- from happening ever again, to anyone… I think that’s as solid a justification as anyone can have.” He sighs, then yawns, covering his mouth with his hand. 

“But you left.” Those words from Fenris were an interrogation once, all suspicion and hatred for running away and perhaps just being angry at himself. Now they’re a simple statement, quieter, with a rise in his voice, a small frown and brows knitting. “You saw the worst of it, and you understand their cause. But you left…?” 

“/We/ left. Justice and I, together.” Anders’s voice is drowsy, a little dreamy, sad as he thinks back on that day. Why had he fled? Why hadn’t Justice marched them both back to the Vigil to face execution for what they had done? "I’m not sure whether I’ve tainted Justice with my cowardice or if he simply didn’t want me to die. Just like you… he took me and ran.“

It might not be the answer Fenris was looking for, but he doesn’t push the topic. “As long as we agree.” He lets the conversation trail off, then, glances over Anders’ features one last time before gently pulling his shoulder away. “We should rest. You can sleep as long as you wish tonight.”

Anders lets Fenris slip away from him, eyes tinged with longing before he veils them with a downward glance. He wears his familiar rueful smile. "Someday… I’ll give the people who care for me more than heartbreak and suffering for their troubles.”

“You should worry about that later.” Fenris unfolds his limbs, gives them a final lingering stretch forward, then the tips of his fingers find the edge of Anders’ clothes. Just the faintest tug, more letting his weight rest along the motion, to coax them down to the dry leaves underneath.

Anders sinks down alongside Fenris and the bed of leaves feels far more soft and inviting than it has any right to. "You’re probably right,“ he murmurs, settling into the leaves with an arm held out to invite Fenris to spoon with him.

Fenris sinks down with no further prompting, arm stretched out and half across Anders’ chest, chin raising and settling along his blond hair. And between Fenris on one side and the tree on the other, bark unforgiving plates but still a constant comforting pressure, it seems things might be better, soon.  
Later, and later still, well after Fenris had decided to keep watch in the night for any danger or passing food, he falls asleep. 

Deep into his slumber something pricks his ear, a tiny sound less than the breeze but distinct enough, and then a louder rustling. Even then, it wouldn’t have stirred him if it wasn’t a sound branded into his mind, the walk of a line of people, their leather and metal armor shifting as they walk, their lanterns dotting Fenris’ vision as he cracks open his eyes. Drowsy at first, shot wider as a moment of adrenaline wakes him, then shut again, tightly. He nuzzles his head down, lips to Anders’ ear, and tightens his grip on the shoulder under his hand. “Wake up.”

Anders shakes awake, heart thundering in his ears so hard it drowns out the headache that would otherwise crowd in on his awareness. He lifts his head, gasping but quickly stifling his voice, and stares around them, blind in the darkness.

Fenris’ hand eases on Anders’ shoulder, drifts to his chest slowly then stops. There’s no voice to his words, no tones, hardly a whisper and silent were they not so absolutely close. “There’s a line of slave catchers coming this way.” Instead of the expected image of Fenris getting ready, hand reaching for his sword, he buries his face closer along Anders’ cheek, even when his muscles are giving away how on edge he’s becoming.

Anders keeps his arm around Fenris’s back, motionless for the sake of silence. Still, that arm tightens, slow and deliberate, a tacit reminder that Fenris isn’t alone. Anders gathers his wits, his will, his power, feeling it fill up the space around his heart like a deep breath of ozone-tasting air and make the hairs on his body stand on end. He listens, and waits to see if the slave hunters, or perhaps mage hunters, pass them by.

Whoever they are, the line gets closer. The men make no attempt at staying quiet, practically stomping through the underbrush, cursing when they get caught up in thorny vines and chattering amongst themselves when they’re not. Even without looking Fenris can hear the swords at their hips, a heavy weighty thing with leather sheaths thudding against metal guarded thighs. “Don’t move.” If that wasn’t obvious enough, but now his words are a command, no more shoulds and shouldn’ts. Perhaps he can feel the readying energy under his palm, invisible static tickling at the lyrium.

Anders stays still, even his breathing deliberate and slow. He can barely make out the silhouette of Fenris’s face in the darkness and his eyes are wide, expecting flickers of torchlight at any moment. He listens to whatever gruff words the hunters exchange, trying to place their accents, gather anything he might about who they are, and which of them they’re looking for.

Unfortunately nothing they say gives them away, too busy chattering amongst themselves, with a voices not quite local but distinctly not Starkhaven. But the way they talk is casual, not the bored killing time about a job they don’t care about, but the same idle alertness wolves have before a hunt.   
“Over here!”  
A spike of tense muscle strikes Fenris as if he’s been hit, but before he leaps into movement he realizes the voice is farther down the approaching line, not meant for them. The thought doesn’t calm him; the line begins to collapse as the other men come to investigate, risking passing right alongside them, and even if they’re missed entirely he’s laying motionless when someone else may be carted off into slavery or worse.  
“A bunch of sticks, you dolt. Clear!”  
The last word passes down the line and they halt, and slowly begin to fan out again. Curses grumble out, mere feet away and no lantern lit, but the owner turns and trudges past. 

Anders is growing just as tense, his jaw clenched. It’s so easy to imagine these men as Templars. It’s certainly the image his mind’s eye provides. Yet what he feels now isn’t the rage that’s become so familiar to him, Vengeance’s heedless anger. It’s only terror, mortal, mundane terror, like he’s known so many times in his life. For a moment though that terror ebbs in the realization that he isn’t spending these tense moments asking himself why he doesn’t just kill these men.

It seems too easy, a feeling that leaves Fenris wary, but the line of mens’ voices grow distant and their torches become small flickers in the night. If any or a number of them stayed behind they’re quiet enough to not bother his ears, or his eyes when he finally tips his head up to glance at their surroundings. 

There will be no more sleep tonight, with that lingering uncertainty, or with the adrenaline still shooting through Anders’ veins. He stays just as still, just as silent, even though gradually his panic relents and his body relaxes. Please let them be gone, he chants in his mind. Please let them be gone, let them not find us.

Fenris waits until silence fills his ears. When it does, the sounds of men are the least of it, their heavy boots on crunching twigs and chatter and creaking hinges of old lantern handles, lost amongst the missing calls of birds and bats and frogs and deer’s hooves on leaves. Even the insects seem quiet. It comes to a point that when Fenris lifts his head, then props himself to sit up, the decision is half that nobody is around and half that he wouldn’t mind an ambush for the sake of making noise.  
His fingertips crumple the ground underneath them, something that almost seems to echo, but nothing happens. Nobody shouts, the line of men don’t come running back, and he lets out a sigh of relief.

Anders is shaking. "Do we run?” He rasps, barely voicing the words. His eyes have adjusted to the darkness, though there’s still so little he can see by starlight, so he gazes up through the gaps in the branches above them at a sky like velvet. 

Another, though shorter pause, Fenris scanning their surroundings one last time before falling to a slow shake of his head before he looks back to Anders. “No. Slavers scare you into running so they can catch you. They won’t cross back over ground they’ve covered. There’s no point. If they’re Chasers they’ll cover ground until dawn.”

Anders nods, taking a deep breath and trying to breathe his fear out with it. “There won’t be more of them?” For a moment his hand closes around one of Fenris’s wrists, panic rising at the thought that the elf might get to his feet and put distance between them, even a few paces. He forces himself to let go. 

The skin only twitches under his touch, a faint flinch, but no other movement accompanies it, even when released. Fenris hardly acts like he notices at all. “If they’re Chasers, there are. But not ones we need to worry about.”

Slowly, eventually Fenris follows suit to sink back down to Anders’ side. More of his chest drapes across chest, nose burying to the comfortable crook between the leaves and a warm ear. “I’ll stay awake, if it worries you.”

“No, I’d rather you were rested,” he whispers again. He leans the side of his face against the crown of Fenris’s head. Even with the change in color, his hair still smells the same, and the familiarity is comforting.


	66. Chapter 66

The rest of the night is damp and cool, and while Fenris sleeps lightly he isn’t sure Anders got even that much despite their stillness together. Dawn is just risen and fog lifting with the heat when they set out on the move again, eager to be rid of the woods for a while, and with the decision comes a light rain.   
On the road there are fresh tracks of a cart, deep and too fresh to be from the previous day and too washed by gentle rain to be from a market cart traveling with the early sun. Enough to prove the men were more than a terrible nightmare, but with no way to tell which direction the cart was going they have little choice but to simply proceed on.  
Several carts come their way over the course of the day, though none with supplies or food, horses slow and plodding, hides dark with water or sweat and hooves caked with mud. One with enough heavy barrels of alcohol to tease them but already sold, another of grain seed, and the last with nothing, an empty pallet and horses looking as worn as the both of them feel. That one they both just wearily glance to the driver and continue on, though at least the driver passes information as to how close the next town is.  
Even with that knowledge the next town looms on the horizon earlier than expected, with many hours of the day still to them. Fenris suggests they buy what food they can and continue, but with a small marketplace of traders still lively they instead end up with a bow and a small bundle of arrows.  
This is how Fenris ends up in the forest, a bow and one of the arrows in his hands, looking unenthusiastically at a young tree a little ways out into the forest. “Wouldn’t it be easier for you to just…” He waves a hand towards the tree, the thin rod of an arrow gesturing with him.

“/Now/ you’re in favor of using magic as a shortcut?” Anders leans back against the trunk of a tree behind Fenris and well out of his way, chewing on a strip of hard, dried venison they managed to trade for.  
It’s at this moment, with Fenris standing with the bow in his hands and looking flummoxed, that Anders realizes he’s never heard the elf make any covetous comments about Bianca. That crossbow had been the envy of the party. Even Sebastian had gazed at her with bedroom eyes and a wistful smile. But Fenris, apparently, wouldn’t have known what to do with her if he’d had her.  
Anders was no stranger to the many ways Fenris could manage to look lost, and the ways he tried to hide them under stoicism and occasional formality, but this was different. Different, and not nearly as tragic, so Anders is smiling in spite of himself, his eyes twinkling with that mirth and mischief life can’t seem to crush out of him.  
“I could, but I’d set the forest on fire and alert anyone for acres in any direction that there’s a mage throwing lightning at wildfowl. Unless there’s a local superstition about small, maverick thunderclouds chasing the game away. It’s not that hard, you know. I mean, Sebastian’s a crack shot so how hard can it really be?”

The arrow drops like lead that actually manages to weigh Fenris down. He scowls at the tree they decided to pick on, and seems ready to growl something unintelligible, though only an irritated huff and faint snarl comes out. The curl to his lips even out just as quickly, expression smoothing out to something more focused. Fenris raises he bow, arrow lifted and now feeling almost too light as he props it into place, thumb lifted to keep it alongside the wood, turning his shoulder as he pulls the string back with a tight grip, chin tipping close to check the aim.  
The string is released and thee arrow flies in practically the opposite direction, a high arc that falls well short of it’s target even if it had been going the right direction. the bow drops to Fenris’ side again along with his shoulders, and he sighs. “I don’t think you’re giving Sebastian enough credit.”

That familiar huff has Anders struggling not to grin. No “damn mage” but he can almost hear Fenris thinking it. “Probably not, but I’m not inclined to correct that either.” Anders crosses one ankle in front of the other, managing to convey almost Hawke-like levels of insouciance with the exception on how his eyes stay glued on Fenris’s back, or at least the back side of him. “Try shooting towards the target this time,” he suggests.

Fenris rolls his eyes at that as he reaches down to pick up another arrow. Again he straightens, the bow pulls with his shoulder and his gaze narrows down the thin sliver of wood. If only this were won by determination alone; the bow quietly creaks from his grip on it alone. And again the arrow sets off on a course drastically different from where he’s aiming, and sputters to the leaflitter before hitting anything. The determination drains from him, and he trudges off to collect the two misses. He doesn’t exactly have to go far. “This was a waste.”

“You expected to be proficient at it after two attempts?” It’s what Fenris would say to Anders, if their positions were reversed. “Keep trying, you’ll get it. Maker knows you’re good at everything -else- physical or athletic. Was learning swordsmanship easy for you?” Anders takes a few steps to help out when Fenris goes to collect the stray arrows, but stops short as the elf reaches both of them before he does. At least he has a good view when Fenris bends down to collect them.

“/I don’t recall./” is the rumbling reply. As nice as he might look when Fenris turns back on his heel the irritated expression is a bit less so. The bow is dropped along with the two arrows into the remaining pile, sword flat alongside, and he sinks his shoulders back against the nearest tree with his arms crossed. And then the short silence, when he wants to say something but doesn’t even put a sigh to it, and pointedly tries to think up something else to say instead. “What gave you the idea I would be any better at this than you?”

“Because you’re good at everything, like I said. You’ve got better eyesight, too, especially in the dark.” Anders’ tone of voice is that of a man who thinks he’s stating the obvious. “I can try, if you like. I haven’t used a bow since I was ten, but I suppose that’s a little more experience than you’ve got.” Anders steps closer, watching the stormclouds in Fenris’s expression. He presses his lips together in a moment of internal deliberation, but it’s a deliberation that passes quickly. He plants his palms on the tree trunk to either side of Fenris and leans in to kiss him, hard.

A small muffled sound is the only response Fenris can make, the beginning of the sentence he was about to mutter forced out in surprise. His shoulders relax to the bark behind them, then taught stomach melts, neck, and finally his expression, eyebrows lifting high then knitting as the lids shut and he lets the world close and narrow to that kiss and little else.  
When it ends he opens his eyes again, but turns his head to give a weakly troubled glare off in the direction of the tree and bow nearby.

Anders melts as much as Fenris does, and what began as an insistent intrusion of his tongue turns to something lingering, hungry but sweet. His eyes also flutter shut, his world narrowing down to the warmth of their bodies, Fenris’s cool mouth and agile tongue, the subtle smell of his breath and the feeling of it hitting his cheek. He smiles when the kiss ends, but then he follows where Fenris’s gaze is pointing, even while leaning against him slightly. “Do you really want to give up?”

The response isn’t immediate, not as quick as Fenris would want it to, his eyes weighing downward as he debates it. If it were up to him, clearly, he’d splinter the thing and have nothing more to do with it, but Anders does have a point with it. And he never did like depending on anyone, especially when coin was lower than usual.  
… but learning archery seemed impossible when he’d never even paid attention to it before.  
“Maybe later.” With a hint in that grumble that later meant he’d be likely to squirrel away while Anders slept to miss trees in solitude.

“Very well.” Anders’ reply is mild, and he seems disinclined to move away, instead bending his head to rest it against the top of Fenris’s shoulder and breathing out a long, deep sigh. “I… suppose we’d best keep moving, then.”

“Were you expecting gutted rabbits over a fire by nightfall?” A moment later and Fenris almost flinches, uneasily shifting in place under Anders’ weight, as he realizes he hasn’t really talked back until this moment. He curses under his breath, the Tevinter word sharp, short and berating, and he practically bites his tongue to keep from apologizing.

“No. I’d just rather be in bed with you right now.” Anders shifts, draws back enough to look Fenris in the face, but he doesn’t shy away. “I’m not disappointed in you, I’m sorry it must have sounded that way. I’m disappointed I can’t lay us both down somewhere warm and soft and think about nothing at all but you…” He glances away then, voice lowering to a shy murmur.

Fenris rocks on his heels, pushing away from the tree. In the process he unintentionally gently butts his forehead high along Anders’ cheekbone, and he lets the contact rest a moment before he lifts his chin. “We should find the inn, then. I can at least win us a night’s rest.”

“Ah, we get an inn tonight.” Anders sounds cheered by that, but the subtle, brief warmth of Fenris’s forehead against his cheek sinks in so much deeper than his skin. He turns, falls into step beside Fenris, plucking up a stalk of elfroot as he does. If they have time, and a fire, he’ll be able to prepare some simple potions for trading later.

Fenris crouches a moment, picking up the bow and gathering the arrows back together, and holding the tied off bundle to Anders. There’s just no space on his back, with a large sword being picked up with his free hand to set it back into place. “I can’t guarantee soft, but we won’t have to worry about slavers there. Might as well while we still can.”

“Soft is relative, and lately we’ve been sleeping on the ground.” Anders takes the bundle willingly enough, slinging it over his shoulder with bundled pack and staff. “They never came after you in an inn? How unusually polite.”

“Slavers won’t hit an inn unless they haven’t met a quota, and not in a town. Easier for people to ask about us… but I haven’t seen any elves with white hair lately.” They pick their way back to the edge of town, Fenris drawing his cloak tight around his neck, a few merchant houses scattering the landscape before buildings gather together. Even with the market closing the town is lively with final trades, main road small and almost crowded.

“That makes sense. But we still don’t know for certain whether it was slavers or templars that night. Templars wouldn’t be shy about breaking down any doors they have to… and besides, nobody helps an apostate.” Anders lowers his voice, eyes scanning the travelers, the market stalls, but he doesn’t notice any armor being worn.

“Good we didn’t see any then, I’d rather sleep in a room I paid for than be ransacked.” There’s an edge of growling hate to his voice, far too powerful and sure, almost too quick to respond and cover their voices. The inn is obvious enough ahead of them, lights lit and easily the largest building of the town. Inside the main hall is just as busy, quite a few travelers already looking drunk. None of them look bothered by a new pair of faces entering, and too busy at their individual tables to notice anyway.

That edge in Fenris’s voice has been rare lately, but even rarer is to hear it directed at Templars. Yet that dangerous rumble grabs hold of other aspects of Anders’ attention, and attempting to question it on any deeper level becomes fruitless. All he can think about is the sound of it, the times he’s heard that rumble in his ear, Fenris leaning over him, hands pressing down on his shoulders and keeping him pinned to the mattress in the derelict manor, and his skin so flushed and burning hot that even Fenris’s moist breath feels cool on his neck. Color creeps into Anders’ cheeks and he adjusts his breeches, glance darting around the room in search of the innkeeper.

 

Hardly if at all noticing Anders’ ‘discomfort’, Fenris scans the crowd for any familiar warning signs of templars or slavers watching for easy pickings they can catch later. When there aren’t any, just a bunch of travelers and merchants and local drunks, he drifts away from Anders’ side and into the crowd.  
The table he decidedly approaches, not in a threatening darkened corner but definitely clinging to the side of the room to avoid passing drunken jostling, has cards splayed out at the wide table and three players. All three, a man and a woman traveling together and another older man too clean to be on the road but too clear minded to be called a drunk, look up at him pointedly towards the large point of metal strapped to his back, but their wariness fades as he offers to buy the next losing hand a drink.

Anders starts to follow, but he looks at the cards and realizes it’s probably best if he leaves Fenris to it. He takes a deep breath, stares into the large tavern hearth, and tries to think about less provocative things than Fenris’s voice. Or anything else about Fenris. There has to be a way to make himself useful, Anders thinks, so he flags down a serving wench, who points him to the innkeeper. Anders is hoisting his coinpurse to the countertop when the innkeeper holds up one calloused hand and shakes his head. Anders answers with a resigned nod and goes to find a chair by the fire to wait in.

For all that Fenris seems to have abandoned Anders he happens to sit with the fire in full view, and he occasionally glances to the hall’s occupants but no more so than anyone else at the table. So he notices when the innkeeper refuses their money, and it’s not because a mage offered it. Well. These people seem rather nice to take everything from, in any case.

It’s warm, and he’s comfortable, and just knowing he needs to be vigilant isn’t enough to keep Anders awake. He pleads with Justice half-heartedly, but the spirit murmurs to him that Fenris has his eyes open, and with that, Anders nods off where he sits, his head propped against the back of the tall chair. His quiet snores are lost under the buzz of the common room and he seems to all onlookers like any other sleepy drunk, his shaggy blonde hair hanging in his face.

It takes a few hours, though Fenris doesn’t rush with Anders getting some sleep and even begins to force himself to relax, shoulders sinking to his wooden seat back and cloak-covered sword propped opposite; the edge of metal comfortably, comfortingly, pressing to his shoulder. He is winning, but slowly, almost too slow for anyone else to notice to overall score, and several rounds between them all to blur their minds of caring anyway.  
He immediately perks back up again when a templar steps into the inn, a small flinch of movement in his shoulders that the other three notice. The woman with them is the only one to seem concerned, though he silently curses himself for her even noticing that much. “What is it?”  
“Nothing.” Fenris sinks back into place. The templar passes the innkeeper without a word, heading on up the stairs with barely a glance to anyone else. “Just a bad memory from long ago.”  
Her companion speaks up, then, less concerned at those words and more warily curious. “You’re not a-”  
“No. They took my sister.”  
The woman gives the man beside her a small lancing glare, but his question gets the better of her too. “Then /she/ was?”  
“Don’t know. I never saw anything, someone else did.”  
Finally the older man pipes up, more an unrelated comment than anything else when he adds, “Ah, I know him. Ron. He wouldn’t know a mage if it burnt him in the arse.”  
It gains a soft chuckle from the table, and the topic ends there. Though his nerves pester him to leave the moment he sees the templar Fenris stays another hour before he gets up, much to the dismay of his temporary friends, and after lazily hauling the sword to his back he heads to the fire to gently tap Anders’ shoulder.

Anders awakens with a start. He doesn’t make a sound, but his head snaps up, and for a moment there’s only fear in his eyes before he recognizes the man standing over him. His heart is still pounding, but he makes his breathing slow, and he manages a smile. “They’ve got no rooms for us. The innkeep said we can sleep under a table if we want but we’d likely be better…” Anders’ words trail off, gazing past Fenris at a Templar surcoat among the figures at the bar. “…better off elsewhere.”

Fenris gives a small nod, in agreement and that he’s noticed. “It’s fine. Let’s go. I don’t want to sleep where it smells of returned meals.” While he waits for Anders to stand he’s the first one to head out, the one to lock eyes as they pass strangers in the crowd but mostly to block Anders from bolting outright.

Anders’s chest bumps up against Fenris’s back more than once as they wade through the crowd to the doors. He keeps his head down, the presence of the templar just out of view becoming palpable to him like a bruise you try not to press. He doesn’t look at anyone, not until they’re out the door and he sucks in fresh, cold air. It’s a clear, bright night, at least. A sky filled with stars makes the world feel big enough to hide in.

For all the commotion inside there’s barely a soul caught out in the night, either at the inn where there’s warm ale or in one of the homes which are all pointedly a good ways away, up a hill and all little fires flickering dimly. When the door closes behind them, a bright glowing path stretching before them narrows to only a sliver, and they’re plunged into blinding darkness. Slowly their eyes come around to adjusting, even Anders’, the moon nearly full and just enough for any not an elf to see by. There are plenty of buildings around them, all small stone shops or storehouses, dark for the night and locked up with tight alleyways between them. Fenris casts a glance behind him, pausing once he’s taken a few steps from the doorway, half expecting the templar to come after them no matter how much he trusted nothing would happen.  
But nobody follows them, just quiet sounds in his ears from people inside and crickets wandering from the nearby forest. “We can cut through these alleys. Slavers won’t comb the woods this closely.”

“I’ll follow you,” is Anders’s only reply. He hangs a step back to keep from treading on Fenris’s heels, and he draws up the cowl of his cloak. He isn’t certain whether they’ll stay in the town for the night, or strike out to the farms or the forests again. He is only certain that Fenris will make a good choice, the best available. In the quiet outdoors he realizes his heart is pounding again, like the night the slave-catchers, or templars, or whoever they were, passed them by in the woods. He hadn’t felt that terrified vigilance in years, thanks to Hawke’s protection in Kirkwall, but it took no time at all for it to return to him – the shock of fear that went through him every time he even saw a Templar.

Fenris just gives a quick nod even as he turns to lead the way, into the darkness. Without the silver hair and a dark cloak tossed over the sword there’s nothing to catch the moonlight, and once they duck into the shadows of an alleyway the only thing that keeps him visible is his proximity and the quite noise of the soles of his feet against dirt and gravel. They travel like this for a ways, taking turns only he can see, until he stops without warning. There’s a dead end between a couple buildings, that they would have completely passed by save that there’s a beam of moonlight angling in to just faintly make out the blank doorless walls. “We could stay here, the walls would keep us warmer..”

“Let’s.” There’s no acrid smell of old urine or, as Fenris put it, returned meals. Just dust and the smell of cold bricks and old mortar, the shelter of the eaves to either side and something almost like privacy. “We’re out of sight from the street and we’ll be able to slip out of town come dawn.” There’s no soft bed, but there’s a pile of old burlap sacks sheltered by some barrels and empty crates at the end of the alley.  
Anders takes a step or two further along the alley, swallowing and reaching into the pouch on his belt. He slips a canister into Fenris’s hand, not quite able to look at him directly as he murmurs, “I know something else that would keep us warm.”

For a moment Fenris stares at the small object in his hand, before he follows Anders into the forgotten spot of a busy town. “Here?” Perhaps the barn was about as public as he’d been used to lately. But even with that small protest his hands brush along Anders’ hips, one palm open and one holding the small canister, a step closer until warmth traps between them, and Fenris dips his lips to the space just under an ear, with a small whisper. “tell me what you want?” It’s not a playful demand between lovers, or a slave awaiting their next orders, though traces of that still linger in his bones; a plea, the same way one would ask another if they’re doing alright.

“Here is all we have.” Anders leans in, head bowed to Fenris’s shoulder. “Fuck me,” he pleads in a hoarse whisper. “Like you did that first night. I need you so much I could…” He could fall to pieces with that longing. He chokes on the words and shame is burning in his cheeks. “I want you,” he repeats, and finally ventures to look Fenris in the eyes, to try and feel less like a beggar at the gates to the Golden City.

Fenris’ hands raise, slowly and only fingertips gliding along clothes as if Anders might shy away. The gaze, still a bit pitiful, is met with a lean forward, their lips meeting and bodies lightly pressing to each other and the light brush of hair along Anders’ head blinding his view. A few coaxing steps to push them back until Anders’ spine meets the cool stone of the wall, then sinks along it as a palm spreads along a shoulder. Fenris is going slow with this, very precise movements and firm touch. His breath takes a small gasp for air when he pulls away, and while his hand draws away from Anders’ shoulder it’s only to reach back and unsling the sword from his back, and let it fall to the pile of rough cloth behind them, and for the armor across his hands to follow.

Anders reaches to the clasp at his throat. He lets his cloak fall away, and his pack and staff follow Fenris’s sword. His strange shyness, his anxiety, isn’t anything a kiss from Fenris can’t soothe away. He leans back against the stones, feels the uncanny pressure of Fenris’s touch pin him against it, and his breath becomes a soft moan. His hands meet fleetingly behind Fenris’s shoulderblades, holding him, leaning into their kiss and giving Fenris’s mouth a hungry suck. 

This time the moan is out of Fenris, a gasping whisper of a thing. With his hands stripped of cold unforgiving metal he reaches down with one, a warm firm touch drawing along Anders’ shaft then encompassing it through the course fabric of his breeches. There’s a short, but meaningful squeeze before he draws up to work the knot at the top of Anders’ pants with small, pulling jerks. Fenris doesn’t get far with it, fumbling a little with only one hand, and once the edges are just loose enough he hooks a thumb under and gives a rough yank downward. The movements are becoming a bit tattered, faintly frantic, and while a hand is pressed between their hips to grip Anders’ shaft, his tip still rubs along Fenris’ leggings and the hardening bulge pressing against them.

Anders is hard even before Fenris touches him. He feels the tight throb at the root as his cock strains against his breeches, and he does his fumbling best to help Fenris open the laces. When his tip drags across Fenris’s leather-wrapped thigh it leaves a clear, glistening streak in its wake, dripping and eager. He cups Fenris through his leather leggings, pulls at the buckles on his heavy belt, never letting their mouths part for even the time it takes to draw a full breath. He isn’t sure he could, even if he did. He’s panting already, and if they had the privacy of a room to themselves he knows he’d be pleading in moans, whimpers, and clipped words for more. His knees are shaking, and it is so very much like the first time, the uncertainty and the desperation of it, the heady rush of having every craving stoked to its limits and then fulfilled.

For all intents and purposes Fenris would have been content with remaining like this, Anders pressed to the wall and exposed and their lips unable to escape each other and cocks grinding around his knuckles and palm. But he knows he wants more, that he needs to move for the reward, and this isn’t what Anders wanted anyway. Finally, reluctantly and with his breath heavy in his nostrils and hot on Anders’ cheeks, he stops and shoves Anders’ pants down farther to his knees, then breaks the kiss to look down to his own leggings. These he’s faster with even when he only has one hand, fingers nimbly drawing over and loosening knots until he can pull them open and free his cock, balls pulled up to but not quite past the half-untied leather, pillowed like breasts if anyone had the moment to see them.

Anders pushes his hips forward to let his trousers drop, and only the threadbare tunic he wears offers any concealment now. He should feel more vulnerable, he thinks, being stripped in an alleyway, but he doesn’t. Maybe any fear of being seen is so small in contrast with all his other fears as to be laughable. Maybe he simply doesn’t have room for the feeling, as his gaze drops and he feasts his eyes on Fenris, so heart-breakingly graceful at any angle, so ready and so desirable with green eyes smoldering under a fringe of auburn hair. Or maybe it’s that he’s no stranger to secret trysts, from his days in the Tower.

He puts a hand to Fenris’s wrist, urging him to let up his grip for just a moment, and as he does, Anders pulls his tunic off over his head. The shadows of his ribs stretch and settle as he breathes, and the points of his hipbones are sharp and starkly visible, but there’s still a rosy flush of sex in his pale skin, the darkening furrow of hair that makes a straight path from his navel to his loins. He leans back against the wall again, bare back against cold bricks, shivering in spite of himself. His hips are still cocked forward, his chin dipped down and his gaze steady. This is yours, the motion says. All this, entirely yours.

For almost too long of a moment Fenris stares. Struck dumb, or just taking in the sight as much as Anders is of him, a small gulp in his throat that parts a small space between his lips. When he moves again he practically crashes back into place; a clack as the metal in Fenris’ hand and the bare palm of the other return to the stone wall to either side of Anders’ ears, their chests crushing against each other and Anders almost smothered to the wall as Fenris kisses him.  
Hands drag down the wall, slow and the quiet sound of metal and skin sliding along dusty stonework, until they fall into the open air at his sides. Fenris arches then, just enough space between their stomachs for his hands to come together, open the lid under his fingers and dip a couple into the thick oil. They don’t stray far, drawing outward and the clear fluid weighing low and heavy until finally dripping the few inches to spill onto the tips of their erections. His wet fingers follow, swirls a clear glaze over Anders’ slit with his thumb, then his own, then cups both of them to spread enough between them that both cocks almost glisten when the moonlight streams over Fenris’ work.

Anders’ mouth opens to that kiss, warm breath and cool saliva and a firm, yielding tongue. He moans into that kiss, his hips pump and grind forward into Fenris’s slick hand and against his shaft. If he could open his eyes he can imagine what he’d see. Slim, strong fingers, and their flushed tips glistening wet and taut as drums already. His own precum mixes with the salve, swollen drops welling up at his slit, rolling along the head’s shallow cleft. 

They remain like that, as Fenris tightens the lid again and tosses it with their clothes, and with a quick reach forward he hooks his hands across Anders’ thighs and hoists both to his waist, hips rocked forward to help hold his weight comfortably to the wall, and the whole motion effortless.

His thighs spread for Fenris, his legs wrap around Fenris’s hips, and he can feel his lover’s tip prodding so close to the pucker of his ass.

Another moan, and this time Anders’s eyes open. His hazel eyes look… not disbelieving, yet still amazed, as if he needs to check again that this isn’t some Fade-dream. His head drops back against the wall, his panting mouth pointed towards the night sky. "Oh, Maker…“ is his whispered prayer. "Oh, Maker, please take me..”

Fenris doesn’t answer. He doesn’t need to, his weight shifting as he reaches farther with one hand, past Anders’ leg. For a few quiet seconds between them he carefully positions himself under a firm grip, the tip of his cock nuzzling against the small space just past the balls before coming to rest surely. With a rock upward, heels lifting from the ground, he sinks in just enough for the gentle flare of his head to push past and comfortably anchor along the squeeze of Anders’ ass, enough that he can let go and relax his hold. The stone threatens to start digging into Anders’ shoulders but his weight pulls him farther onto Fenris, a slow descent and ass spread farther, fuller, until he stops at Fenris’ waist.  
If his lips were parted before Fenris gapes now, breath already hot and tormented on the skin of Anders’ neck, and as Fenris’ heels settle back to the ground his lips fall forward to suck at the adam’s apple in front of him, with a small groan at his throat and a rough jerk of his hips, then another.

Anders wraps his arms tight around Fenris’s shoulders, even though Fenris’s strength seems enough to hold him and balance him all on its own. Even with rough stones at his back, and gravity pulling him down until Fenris is sheathed in him, the penetration is smooth, surprisingly gentle even if relentless and deep. He’s tense, tight, around Fenris, unused to this in the time they’ve spent on the road, short on food or sleep or comfort. He craved it this way, though – the almost burning fullness, the pressure in him, the muted rasp of Fenris’s voice so near to his ear. He doesn’t say a word, only rocks his hips in tandem with Fenris. finding the tightest fit between their bodies.

Fenris’ lips fall from Anders’ neck soon enough, not of his own choice but simply from the movement and his mouth dropping open loosely with his hot breath. He leans in, forehead coming to rest at the crook of Anders’ neck, his hands lifting away to help prop himself with his palms flat against the wall. Finally he lets himself go, stops holding back and stops worrying if they’ll fall over or if someone will walk by or any other troubles on his mind, places of the stonework rougher than others as they scrape at Anders’ back and Fenris’ hips softly slap against him. There’s barely enough time for gravity to begin pulling before he arches up again, and his body shivers in Anders’ grip when he forces himself to slow down, sinking in then grinding deep before drawing out, every inch of his shaft hugged tight.

When Fenris reins in his rhythm, Anders can feel an echo of his rapid strokes ringing through him. Every nerve seems to resonate with Fenris’s motions, with the contact between their bodies. And every pulse of pleasure, every heavy twitch inside him as Fenris’s shaft slides against his core, makes Anders gasp and crave the next. His arms are locked around Fenris’s shoulders, his hands threading their way through his hair, and his balls tighten to the base of his shaft.

Fenris lets out a low groan, an almost sorrowful sound likely too loud for an outside fuck, but nothing save the cool night and crickets hear them. Maybe the crisp air emphasizes the humid heat between them and the heat in Anders, maybe the time they’ve spent not together yet not apart details the passionate friction between them. The way the tip of Fenris’ cock kisses at the firmer pressure, nuzzles and massages that spot when his toes dig against the ground to thrust deeper. He doesn’t raise his head to Anders’ ear when he whispers, sound still pathetic in it’s yearning even with no voice to it, a quiet and hopeless, “I’m close..”

“Going to…” The words smother in Anders’ tightening throat. A moment of tense silence and he shudders hard, his body milking Fenris’s thick cock in long spasms. He moans, startled, urgent, suddenly fulfilled, and as his cock spills his jism onto his curled belly his skin is so hot that even in the cold night air he sweats. "Fenris, yes,“ he whispers against his lover’s ear. For a moment, bliss erases weariness and other deep-etched lines from Anders’ flushed face, and blasts his thoughts clear of anything but this moment, this feeling, the man inside him.

The speed Fenris began with edges in again, his hands slipping from the wall to settle with palms cupped over the curves of Anders’ hips, the steady control of his pleasure loosening. His grip digs in, holds the bones under their skin in place as he bucks forward, quick at first and then a forceful pound inward as Anders’ climaxes. Fenris hardly lasts longer, Anders hot and tightly massaging his cock to send him over the edge, and with the quietest whimpering groan he plunges deep and spills himself, small spasms twitching him against his hold.

Anders doesn’t kiss Fenris so much as caress him with his lips, brushing them along the fine line of his jaw, the side of his neck, nuzzling in against his shoulder ecstatically. His limbs are loose and languid now, his arms draped around Fenris’s shoulders. There’s a stone digging into his back that he barely notices, the whole world softened in a haze of pleasure, and his darkened eyes are shamelessly content. ”…love you,“ he murmurs.

Fenris doesn’t immediately reply, his orgasm relaxing to a slow, warm throbbing between them and his panting still heavy in his lungs. For a few lingering seconds he remains that way, deep breaths caught against Anders’ skin, just faintly damp with sweat. Finally his lips close and his forehead drops to rest on Anders’ lips, with a shiver that travels up his spine as the cool air tickles at his bare skin, and his nose faintly squeaks with a long exhausted sigh.

Anders unwinds his legs from Fenris’s waist, or tries to. With the way Fenris is holding him, he realizes he’s completely at the elf’s mercy until he lets him go, pinned between the wall and Fenris’s hips and the slowly softening cock inside him. He doesn’t voice any protest, but he begins to shiver in spite of himself, curling tightly into Fenris for warmth.

Fenris lets go the moment the wave of exhaustion passes him, slowly lifts himself away from pinning Anders in place and helping him hold steady until his feet touch and settle to the ground. A horrible mess remains between the two of them, and when Fenris manages a glance downward he huffs a silent chuckle with the hints of a smile pulling at his lips. 

Anders follows that downward glance, looking almost sheepish at the amount of wet semen on his belly and Fenris. "I shouldn’t be surprised,” he murmurs, “it felt like I was coming for ages. Maker…” He drags his fingers through the mess, barely succeeding in wiping any away. He starts to reach for his discarded clothes but pauses, leaning against Fenris for a moment and closing his eyes, as if even their fucking wasn’t enough closeness and touch to sate him.

Fenris is still, weight back on his heels for the first time in what feels like hours and ready to be a warm, breathing statue as long as Anders wants him to be. “We could use those empty bags,” He pauses then, a small glance over his shoulder as if he needed to double check that they were still there, “…though the thought of leading you naked through the woods to get to the river at this hour is tempting.”

Anders pauses in the midst of pulling his pants back on, smiling, mischief in his eyes. "If you want me for a naked jaunt through the forest who am I to refuse?“ His smile breaks into a grin. "But this would be a soft enough place to bed down. Why don’t we rest a while and get out of town before sunrise?”

“It would be a stumble more than a jaunt.” But he doesn’t dispute the proposition. When Fenris finally moves it’s when Anders has left him and he paws through the heap his sword fell onto and reaches for a lighter, smaller bag, the kind one moves fruit in and other easily bruised goods. It rips in half with simple seams, and Fenris passes one of the rags to Anders while cleaning himself up and setting his clothes back to order. 

“Thanks.” Anders takes the rough cloth and begins wiping himself clean. When he’s done he gathers up his tunic and, rather than pulling it on, rolls it up for a pillow. He sinks onto the pile old burlap and pulls his cloak over himself for a blanket, but with one arm held up he offers its shelter to Fenris as well.

Fenris sinks to his knees at Anders’ side but stops there, taking stock of the quiet of their surroundings and how close his sword is before he sprawls out the rest of the way along his stomach. He doesn’t like being cornered to a dead end before anyone even notices them, something he didn’t notice until now, but Anders has a point that it’s softer here, and warmer when they’re sheltered from the wind,and when he puts his head down it’s facing the alley.

Anders watches, quiet, and seeming to understand Fenris’s thoughts. He curls up against Fenris’s back, bare skin against skin, and he sighs with something akin to contentment. "We may yet make it through this,“ he says, and kisses the nape of Fenris’s neck.

“I’ll feel better once we reach Tantervale.” Though he won’t, not really. The only difference would be staying away from slavers more than templars. As long as Starkhaven doesn’t find them. He imagines runners on quick horses, barely pausing to water their beasts, already reaching the outskirts of the city and Sebastian among them, ready to draw a curtain of an army across the landscape on their way back to Kirkwall. Fenris scrunches his eyes closed at that, and buries his brow against the rough burlap to shove away the thought.

Anders hugs Fenris that much tighter. "It was good not thinking about it for a while,” he says with a nervous laugh on his breath. He does his best to try and block the same thoughts from his mind. Whatever happens, they’ll have to face it as it comes. "Listen, whatever happens…“ He trails off, shutting his eyes and pressing his forehead to the space between Fenris’s shoulderblades. ”…Never mind.“

Fenris can’t turn his head far enough to see Anders, not at this position, but he tries anyway. The best he gets is to just shove his face further into the bedding, rough but not altogether uncomfortable against his cheeks, though it does muffle him somewhat when he grumbles out a short, “What.”

”…don’t … don’t you dare get killed. There’s nothing Sebastian or anyone can do to me that would be worse than seeing you … than losing you. “

Another reply, just as muffled and slightly more grumbling, losing the hints of formality the longer he floats in this half awake half asleep lull. “Then have your demon fetch me.”

"I’d rather follow where you go.”

Fenris props himself up, elbows under him and Anders slipped from his back so he can look down at him. “Don’t.”

Anders rolls onto his back, looking up at Fenris’s face. "Why?“

A few long seconds pass, Fenris silent with a glare Anders likely can’t see. Though even in the darkness, Fenris hovering over him, he’s clearly looking over Anders’ face. The edges of bone that come with hunger and troubled sleep, the rougher skin that he’s known it before, the blank look of being clueless to what he just entailed. “If I die for you, don’t waste it killing yourself.”

Anders swallows the lump in his throat. In the darkness, there’s a glimmer along the rims of his eyelids. "Don’t die for me and we won’t have a problem.”

“Promise me you won’t.”

Anders frowns, his own gaze turning sharp. Then, the corners of his mouth tight as if he’s swallowed something bitter, he lowers his gaze in submission. "I promise. But please… please don’t.“

Fenris drops his head, finally, lets his forehead rest on Anders’, tips of their noses alongside each other as he kisses the corner of Anders’ lips. “I don’t intend to.” 

Anders finally feels that knot give way, and he turns his head the minute amount he needs to to give Fenris a kiss on the lips. "Good,” he whispers.


End file.
